#46: Robin Hobb, Assassin's Apprentice (Farseer Trilogy #1)

[kareila]

I can see why this has lately been marketed to fans of Game of Thrones. It is basically wall-to-wall political intrigue. At least it dodges any obvious patriarchal BS for the most part. But the whole thing with the protagonist being born to a crown prince out of wedlock, and thus never able to be more than merely tolerated anywhere in society, becomes extremely tedious.

The story paints a fairly miserable pseudo-medieval world full of loneliness and treachery. What little magic there is comes in the form of telepathy and mental manipulation. The enemies of the kingdom turn out to have a horrifying habit of removing people's emotions, leaving them little more than mindless animals afterward.

I didn't enjoy the book as much as I hoped, but I ended up caring about the characters enough to see how this trilogy ends. I don't know that I'm in for all the sequel series that follow this one, though.

Comments

[jadelennox]

So the general rule of Robin Hobb is that all good people suffer, bad people keep winning, and it's misery all the way down. Other than that they're great, except the conclusion of trilogy three is Actively Terrible.

I have limited stomach for so much misery, and I read them all, but I wouldn't read them again, personally.

[kareila]

Thanks for confirming my suspicions! 😅