Books with title The Earthsea Quartet: "A Wizard Of Earthsea"

A Wizard of Earthsea is a fantasy novel by the American author Ursula K. Le Guin, first published by the small press Parnassus in 1968. It was first novel set in the fictional archipelago Earthsea and it inaugurated the so-called Earthsea Trilogy (1968 to 1972).[1][a] It features the adventures of a budding young wizard named Ged. The tale of Ged's growth and development as he travels across Earthsea continues in The Tombs of Atuan and The Farthest Shore, set a few years and about two decades later. Ged is a young boy on Gont, one of the larger islands in the north of the archipelago of Earthsea. His mother is dead, his much older siblings have all left home, and his father is a dour, taciturn bronzesmith with nothing in common with his son, so the boy grows up wild and headstrong. Ged discovers by accident that he has an extraordinary talent for magic. His aunt, the village witch, teaches him the little she herself knows, but his power far exceeds hers. One day, he uses his talent and a fog-gathering spell he learned from a passing weatherworker to save his village from Karg raiders. The tale of his remarkable feat spreads far and wide, finally reaching the ear of a wise Gontish mage, Ogion the Silent. He recognizes that the boy is so powerful he must be trained so as not to become a danger to himself and others. In the rite of passage into adulthood, he gives the boy his "true name", Ged, and takes him as an apprentice. In this world, a magician who knows someone's true name has control over that person, so one's true name is revealed only to those whom one trusts completely. Normally, a person is referred to by his or her "use name". Ged's is Sparrowhawk. The undisciplined young man grows restless under the gentle, patient tutelage of his master. One day, at the taunting of the daughter of the local lord - who, it is later revealed, is also a witch - Ged seeks a powerful spell from one of Ogion's old books to impress the girl.

In print for more than three decades and translated into dozens of languages, here is the audio release of the first book in The Earthsea Trilogy. This is a tale of wizards, dragons, and shadows, played in an archipelago of imagined islands. The young boy Sparrowhawk becomes apprentice to a Master Wizard; but impatience to learn faster takes him far from home to Roke Island, where he enters the School for Wizards. As a student of magic, Sparrowhawk exceeds his years in accomplishment, but pride and jealousy drive the boy to try certain dangerous powers too soon. A terrible evil is let loose in the land.

The first book of Earthsea is a tale of wizards, dragons and terrifying shadows. The island of Gont is a land famous for wizards. Of these, some say the greatest - and surely the greatest voyager - is the man called Sparrowhawk. As a reckless, awkward boy, he discovered the great power that was in him - with terrifying consequences. Tempted by pride to try spells beyond his means, Sparrowhawk lets loose an evil shadow-beast in his land. Only he can destroy it, and the quest leads him to the farthest corner of Earthsea.

High Fantasy by Hugo and Nebula award winner, Ursula K. LeGuin. Book 1 of the Earthsea Cycle. "In his day Ged, called the Sparrowhawk, became both dragonlord and Archmage. His story is told in many songs, but this is the haunting tale of a proud, lonely boy in the time before his fame. It is a tale of wizards, dragons and shadows played out in Earthsea, a world of numberless islands and vast oceans where mages, looking for adventure, wandered, working magic..."

A superb fourpart fantasy comparable with the work of Tolkien and CS Lewis the Earthsea books follow the fortunes of the wizard Ged from his childhood to an age where magic is giving way to evil As a young dragonlord Ged whose usename is Sparrowhawk is sent to the island of Roke to learn the true way of magic A natural magician Ged becomes an Archmage and helps the High Priestess Tenar escape from the labyrinth of darkness But as the years pass true magic and ancient ways are forced to submit to the powers of evil and death