These were Le Guin's "pilot" stories for Earthsea. While they are fascinating, they contain some inconsistencies with the later lore, so they are best read as curiosities after you've finished the main series.
To help you decide, here is what each book offers: order of earthsea books
Skipping Tales and moving straight to The Other Wind (the final novel) is a disservice to the narrative arc. The Other Wind resolves the conflicts introduced in Tehanu regarding dragons and the afterlife. Without the lore established in Tales , the resolution of The Other Wind feels unearned. Therefore, the "True Order" of Earthsea is not merely chronological but iterative: These were Le Guin's "pilot" stories for Earthsea
The Farthest Shore ends with what appears to be a definitive close to the saga. The threat is vanquished, the king returns, and the world is healed. Reading the series in publication order preserves this illusion, allowing the reader to feel the closure that Le Guin originally intended. It makes the subsequent return to Earthsea all the more startling. The Other Wind resolves the conflicts introduced in
" (1964) : These early stories helped define the setting before the first novel was written. The Daughter of Odren " (2014) : A standalone novella set in the Archipelago.
(1971) : Follows Tenar, a young priestess in the Kargish Empire, whose life intersects with Ged's during a dangerous quest. The Farthest Shore
Suddenly, the series was no longer a linear adventure story about a wizard saving the world; it became a complex, subversive critique of its own early assumptions. Consequently, the question of reading order is no longer logistical—it is thematic. To read the Earthsea books is to witness an author dismantling her own creation to build something deeper, and the order in which one approaches these texts determines whether the reader sees a ruin or a cathedral.