Annals of the Western Shores--whether it's a now-complete trilogy or the beginning of a longer series--covers weighty issues in each volume, but never becomes preachy or message-driven. The focus of Gifts was primarily on the morality of ones' talents and how they should be used; Voices set up the religious elements of the world. Now, in Powers, we're visiting a third geographic region of the Western Shores and exploring themes of identity, compassion, and what it means to go home.

I'm finding I like this series more and more, the further we get from Orrec and Gry. LeGuin's talents lie in world-building over character development--I never come away from one of her books feeling that I've gotten to know the protagonist so much as used him as a vehicle to understand the world he lives in. Powers is no exception, but for the first time in this series, I've finally come to understand, to fall into, the world setting LeGuin has created. I don't know if this is because the other two were just too brief (this volume clocks in at 500 pages; 150 more than Voices and 200 more than Gifts) and she needed more space to play, or if there's something about this particular region that appealed to me more.