The Farthest Shore

Written by Ursula K. Le Guin

Narrated by Rob Inglis

Return to the windswept world of Earthsea in the third book of this magnificent fantasy saga.

As a young wizard, Ged boldly entered the sacred labyrinth of Atuan to steal the magical ring of Erreth-Akbe from the dark forces of the world. Now, as Archmage and Dragonlord, an older Ged faces an even greater challenge. Prince Arren has
come to tell him that the magic has gone out of Earthsea. All over the world, mages and wizards are forgetting their spells, and the springs of magic are running dry.

With Arren by his side, Ged sets off on a harrowing quest for the source of darkness slowly creeping over the world. The journey leads the pair past enchanted islands, fire-breathing dragons, and cunning villains—and straight to
the shores of death. Only there can hope be found for the wounded land.

Lauded as one of the best-loved fantasy classics of this century, Ursula K. Le Guin’s Earthsea saga will sweep you into a fantastic land of wizardry and high adventure.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Recorded Books, Inc.
• Release date: Jun 25, 2010
• ISBN: 9781449840822

Ursula K. Le Guin

Ursula Kroeber Le Guin (1929-2018) was a celebrated author whose body of work includes twenty-three novels, twelve volumes of short stories, eleven volumes of poetry, thirteen children’s books, five essay collections, and four works of translation. The breadth and imagination of her work earned her six Nebula Awards, seven Hugo Awards, and SFWA’s Grand Master, along with the PEN/Malamud and many other awards. In 2014 she was awarded the National Book Foundation Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters, and in 2016 she joined the short list of authors to be published in their lifetimes by the Library of America.

Reviews for The Farthest Shore

[Guy Naim · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Great book in my opinion. Aged a bit, but still

[Pascale Smith · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

The narrator is awful. He completely destroys this well written book

[Andre Lefebvre · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

As magnificent and rich as when I first read it in 1978! The battle between good and evil is there in plain sight. The book is filled with thoughtful descriptions of persons and lands, insights into the psyche of humans and beasts, it looks straight into the dangers and sobering grandeur of quests and self-sacrifice. And deep magic, dragons, and cosmic balance. The other books of the Earthsea Chronicles are as good and exciting to read. UKL was a master storyteller. Her works will take years to exhaust. :)

[sarahehwilson · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I am a huge fan of the Earthsea cycle, though I think this may be the weakest link in the chain. The storytelling and writing were both powerful, as usual, and the theme of how extreme fear of death corrupts is well-explored (Voldemort seems like an over-the-top moron compared to the more subtle portrayal here, much as I like the HP series too). But somehow it doesn't all quite hold together for me. I think that's why LeGuin ultimately had to write two more sequels (plus a few short stories) to sort out all the implications of what she was saying. I'm especially struck by the fact that Ged's actions intended to restore the balance between life and death, but it's clear that death is infinite compared to life, so it is hardly balanced. That problem isn't solved until The Other Wind.

[Merle Arrowsmith · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Another spellbinding sequel of the Earthsea book cycle, wonderfully narrated!

[selfnoise · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Le Guin explores the fear of death and change in this elegant novel. It's the last in the unofficial "original" trilogy... the books written later, while good, diverge from these first three in some important respects.

[msjoanna · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

A satisfying conclusion to the original Earthsea trilogy. The book is darker and more brooding than the first two books, but also more introspective and for that reason, quite interesting. The world of Earthsea continues to be developed in this book and new information about dragons, magic, and lore are introduced. Overall, I think the second book is my favorite of the three, but I enjoyed this one. I'll have to watch for the newer Earthsea books.

[comfypants · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Meh. Too abstract to work as an adventure, and one of the only two main characters is entirely uninteresting.

[kplatypus_1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

The third novel of the Earth-Sea cycle, [The Farthest Shore] is again different in style from the previous books. If [A Wizard of Earthsea] is a traditional coming-of-age/magical training book, and [The Tombs of Atuan] is a coming-to-terms with one's beliefs book, [The Farthest Shore] is a sea journey with a grand quest in the epic tradition. The characters (the familiar Ged and the new Arren) are as complex and flawed, yet likable, as ever. I didn't find this as interesting as the previous two novels, since it lacked the philosophical depths of those books, and sometimes seemed to jump around a bit. Nonetheless, it was a solid contribution to the genre.

[wirkman_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

The tale of Ged concludes in this, the final installment of Le Guin's great 1970s fantasy trilogy. What? Oh, yeah: Le Guin continued the tales in later installments. "Tehanu" was, I thought, quite bad. I haven't read the others yet. End here, perhaps. Or not. The tales are good, if humorless. Le Guin is a romantic, and humor is not her vein. She mines myth.

[jasmyn9 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

The third book in the Earthsea Cycle follows the wizard Ged and young Prince Arren as they search for the reason behind the forgetting of magic. Magic users across the many islands of Earthsea are forgetting the words of magic and going mad, and it seems to be spreading.This is a great story of conquering your fears and overcoming what appears to be more than you can handle. It show the value of friendship and commitment. This was a wonderful follow up to the first two books. I have the fourth on my soon to be bought list.My only complaint is again of the large gap with little to no information of what happens between the stories. I'm the type of reader that enjoys knowing even the more boring parts of the characters lives.3.5/5

[S Sri · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Very dramatic and sombre and all such heavyweight. A bit too much.

[diwanna_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Book 3 in the Earthsea Cycle. Can Ged stop the death of magic? This book has a real melancholy feeling, a sense of helplessness and desperation. Even in the conclusion there is no feeling of happiness. Another good book, but not a feelgood book.

[emscape · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

The Farthest Shore tells the story of how Sparrowhawk, now Archmage, travels with Arran to the absolute end of the world and beyond to defeat a wizard who thinks he has conquered death and in so doing has opened the door to death so that all life and magic are draining out of the world. People have forgotten wizardry and are obsessed with immortality. Woven into the tale of their quest is the idea that the Balance must be preserved and that life and death are just two sides of the same coin. A very fitting and enjoyable end to the Earthsea trilogy, and the tale of the life of Sparrowhawk.

[Arnis · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A great majestic story! This one was less than the first two, but still a lot of great listening to be had.

[rbeffa_2 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

The Farthest Shore was a great third book in the original Earthsea Trilogy. I'd have to say it was my favorite. Dark, sad, comtemplative. A lot of philosophy and thoughts on life and death and the balance. A rather hard kick at those who would seek eternal life. Ursula Le Guin can write. I don't think I would appreciate this novel as a teen or a young man as much as I do in middle age. It leaves me quite sad. I've grown quite fond of Ged and his journey.I'll be reading more Le Guin this year, that is for certain.

[meditationesmartini · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Mild fail. Like the previous two books, this is a Bildungsroman, but where they make a neat pair--boy and girl, myth and psychological thriller, golden boy wizard and hurt, magicless child--this one brings in a prince called Arren about whom we get little background and into whom little insight, except that he is strong and brave and worships Sparrowhawk and is destined to be the returned King. And okay, if you wanted a king you'd choose a guy like that, but this book covers entirely too much of the same ground already looked at by A Wizard of Earthsea--except at least in that Ged wrestles with some real internal evils. Arren just helps out, gets pissy, inherits the throne.

It's also the book where Le Guin gets around to trying standard fantasy forms, but she gets them rather muddled. This is the world outof joint book, but there's no rhyme or reason: magic disappearing; archvillain messing with the world of the dead; dragons perishing and afraid--there's nothing to tie these catastrophes together. Why are they together? Just to show how bad it all is?

This is also the "world tour" book, but we still have not seen most of the centre of Earthsea--Le Guin seems to think mentioning places is enough--and we just putz around the edges. the place for this was in one of the first two books. I could imagine a quite satisfactory combo of The Farthest Shore and Tombs of Atuan, but that wasn't the way Le Guin chose to go. The tour, and the final sail to the ends of the earth, does give us the opportunity to meet the raft people--amazing--and get some Moebiusy 2d black mountains and such in the land of the dead.

And there are other things with pacing, suspense, secrets and revelations, that Le Guin seems to completely not get or ignore because she's so preoccupied with her parable (which, again, is less interesting than in either of the first two books, the ultimate message here seemingly that we should not fear death but should treat it with respect and live, but also that we need our social betters, in this case mages and kings, to take care of us). There is a complete failure to do the most basic of awesome genre conventions, when instead of bringing back any of the undeveloped characters from the original--Jasper, Vetch--or giving us a cameo by Tenar or Ogion, Le Guin makes the villain this laughable head case called--of all things--Cob, who is scared of death and gets into things he can't master and lets loose mere anarchy until he is taken care of--not by our heroes, who stand by while the dragon Orm Embar shows up to do the hard work, then pursue Cob into the land of the dead where sparrowhawk finishes the job with some ill-defined plot MacGuffin which results in him losing his powers (third-rate Chris Claremont, this). Le Guin doesn't pursue the most obvious, cheap--nay, free--way of giving him piquancy as a villain, which is to make him Jasper, Ged's arrogant bete noire from the first book. Vetch does not show up, do something heartbreakingly loyal, and sacrifice his life for the cause. again, the feeling is, we are not meant to care about the characters; they are only a didactic vehicle for the message. And in this case the message--see above--is one about which I both have mixed feelings and find fairly uninteresting.

[lisamaria_c · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

In this last book of the trilogy the now Archmage Ged journeys to that farthest shore--the ends of the earth--to defeat a wizard claiming to have conquered death--and draining out of the world music and magic as a result. Ged believes that the wish for immortality is the root of evil. A theme I could see in C.S. Lewis and is also at the heart of J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter series. More overtly philosophical than the first two Earthsea books, like them its allegorical quality is obvious, but this one is still brim full of adventure and invention--and of course like all LeGuin's works beautifully written. I could wish that rather than the (to me) rather uninteresting Prince Arren that Ged had a companion we knew from the earlier books, such as Tenar. But then Prince Arren does make this book, like the others, a coming of age tale about a young person coming to grips with themselves and their world. And hey, LeGuin does make up for that a great deal with the awesomeness of her dragons.

[horomnizon · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

So far, I liked this book the best out of the original trilogy. It goes back to the adventure that existed in the first book, but was seriously lacking in the second. Plus, a bit of mystery was added and I enjoyed the addition of the prince as Ged's traveling companion. I enjoyed the addition of new islands and tribes like the raft people, too. Definitely delving into some serious topics with death and afterlife, but LeGuin doesn't force her own opinion on the reader. The book can be looked at as philosophy or fantasy, depending on your personal beliefs. But it certainly will make you think! I found it quite enjoyable.

[willowcove · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A classic and a great series. While all three are good, I personally enjoyed the first two the most.

[sullywriter_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Lovely prose in this allegorical adventure but not enough plot to stay consistently compelling.

[shanaqui_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

When I first read Earthsea, this was probably my least favourite book. Probably because throughout it the world I've started to love is dying and in pain. The pain isn't just the characters, it's the whole world; it's less a personal journey and of significance for the whole of the world. I mean, it wasn't like a Ged-gebbeth wasn't a big threat to the world, or finding the ring of Erreth-Akbe wasn't important, but the story in this world is all about the failing of the world -- not a single thing going wrong, but everything. I know that in the end everything is fine, but that takes a big sacrifice on Ged's part, his power. And Ged isn't just his power, I know that, too, but it still saddens me a lot now that he has to lose it.

I guess this story changes the world of Earthsea in a fundamental way: returns a king to the throne, changes magic, has the world decaying, has wizards losing their power.

Even though I like the story better now than I did when I was younger, I still feel a little resentful about that.

It's still beautiful, of course -- the ideas, and the descriptions. The raft-city, and Arren, and dragons, and the Mountains of Pain. It's all very vivid and appeals to my synaesthesia. The discussion of the importance, the value, of death, is interesting, too. And always relevant, no matter who you are. I'm closer to Arren's point of view on this than Ged's: the Ged of The Farthest Shore is older and wiser than when we last saw him, and certainly far wiser than when we first saw him. He's a bit beyond me, still. But the things he says to Arren about the importance of death do resonate with me. I wouldn't want immortality anyway, I think it'd get boring, but Ged makes a good case for the importance of death as a part of life -- not as a waste, the end of life, but as something that gives value to life.

It's a difficult subject to catch in words, I think, and Ursula Le Guin does it well.

Still not my favourite book, though... oh, Ged.

[raschneid_1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Liked it, but honestly the plot didn't do much for me. I liked the philosophical aspects, but I'm not sure they led to any really compelling conclusion. Nevertheless an enjoyable read.

[nesum_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

The first is still my favorite of the three, but this one comes close. Le Guin's writing flows through this story very beautifully, though probably at a different pace than the modern reader is used to. Still, I do not regret a moment, in any book, that I spent upon the open sea with Ged, and it is time I cherish.I am anxious to start this series again, but I rather like to let these stories wash over me a while before heading to another.