Assassin's Quest

Flipping no. Just no, they could’ve written worse. But not by much. I just finished this book. (Seriously less than ten minutes ago) And I just. I’m done really. I am now left with an empty, meaningless feeling so.. Yeah. Great. I may not read another Robin Hobb book for as long as I’ll live. I’m not sure. I don’t recommend it. *spoilers beyond here don’t say I didn’t warn you* Everything was wrong. Everything. The Elderlings should’ve been wizards that could teleport and Verity shouldn’t have died-ish. Fits should’ve stayed true to Molly and immediately returned to her, and that would’ve been easy if Verity didn’t have to carve a flipping dragon. Almost everything about the Fool was odd so don’t even go there. Starling was a whiny attention seeker. Kettricken should’ve gone with Verity in the first place, then she wouldn’t be heartbroken and alone forever. Verity should’ve paused from protecting the coasts for one second to fix Regals childlike rebelliousness at the start. He had power! Kettle should’ve come out of secrecy when the forgings began, and given Verity the knowledge about the Skill defending Elfbark. The side delay with the “old blood” people? Yeh, they had no purpose. We couldn’t be there for any future interactions, so what was the point? Why waste all of that time writing and agonizingly long travel story when you could’ve just fixed the plot? Why couldn’t everything be perfect? You have ideas, Robin. You had a way to fix everything, and yet.. This happens. In the beginning he is lonely beyond measure. In the middle he finds love but is told to leave her, so she leaves him and eventually believes him dead and marries his father figure. And in the end he spends his days in unhappy, and meaningless solitude raising a boy who will probably turn out like him. There was no happy ending. The End.

Ok the book was quite well written and all that so yeah that’s good I guess. But I feel like the author just abandoned the characters and that were important to the story. I wanted to hear more from Burrich but there just wasn’t enough. Plus, it changed from the spying and Assassin stuff in the royal court in the first two books, to a long journey with no real goal. I guess I just wanted a book where Fitz could be Fitz and Burrich could take care of his horses and Verity could be there for everyone. I guess it was solid though. I read the whole book in 10 hours, but I don’t know if it was because the book was so interesting or because I was feeling too lazy to do anything else.

By now, I’ll assume you’ve read the other two books in the series. Hobb has a writing style that is intriguing but not overly complicated. This book is no exception and with two other books to give ample back story, this one feels like the last book of a trilogy should feel like. There is plenty of action to go around but Hobb does a great job of not rushing through anything. If you’re anything like me you were excited that this was such a big book and you had more time to spend with Fitz and his pack. The book definitely didn’t end the way I thought it would. That’s a good thing for us readers. We don’t want predictability do we? The ending was a bit bittersweet to me, wether that was because of the events or because I had to say goodbye (for now) to Fitz....I’m not sure. Make sure you read the whole story and if you’re anything like me, you’ll want to continue living in this world with the next books written by Hobb.

I wish I had a dragon so I could drain my feelings of this book in it. I'm going to try to forget this book as fast as I possibly can, the ending makes me sick and I never want to even hear the name Burrich or Molly ever again.

Series could have been deftly and compellingly completed in TWO books not three (like almost every modern series). Instead it meanders in third title endlessly with redundant character development and overly deliberate plot. Very compelling characters here that are better than most but third book leaves one grasping for more satisfaction and at times action.

Great fiction has character development. Great fiction has plots that are both plausible and surprising. The first two books in the Assassin series had both. Yes, they were works of fantasy, but they were not superficial comic book efforts. The characters had other-worldly capabilities, but they capabilities were finite and followed a set of rules; the characters used those characters to follow goals that grew and changed as the characters grew and changed. The books were great. Here the fantasy world's fundamental physics changed constantly. There were no predictable limits on characters' capabilities. There were no restrictions on the author. Anything is now possible. It's amazing how totally this destroys interest in the plot. This made character behavior incomprehensible. It enabled the author to place characters in lethal situations constantly and to rescue them effortlessly. I finished the book out of stubborness. I finished the previous two enthusiastically. This was a disappointment.