This one grew on me quite a bit. It's more directly Taoist in its inspiration than the previous two books and is a lot about the nature of life and death and how life is defined by having an end and you shouldn't be that concerned about death because you're going to die, we all are, that's the point (well, the full stop really). Brings back dragons and these seem if anything more traditional Fantasy dragons than in "A Wizard of Earthsea." 

Go into this expecting a quest adventure and you will be disappointed. Expect Ged retreading the story of AWOE with his own disciple (who nonetheless has no magical ability whatsoever; but Ged is fine with that, the world can't consist of just wizards. Arren has courage and is also a skilled swordsman with a sword that is cursed - not really the word - to be used only in defence of the good). Left a far better feeling than I thought it would. And there's silk weavers, more stories should include them. And there are raft-dwellers - people of a sea-city, not a fixed platform but a flotilla that only makes land once a year. At times the prose approached the purple of Cormac McCarthy and at times i was indeed reminded of that author (at least once. Very similar or perhaps more like 'In the Rogue Blood'), but not only that.