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A review by alexblackreads
Royal Assassin by Robin Hobb
4.0
This is a good follow up to Assassin's Apprentice, but it didn't quite do everything I wanted. I cut the first book some slack because it was the first book. Its focus was introducing the world and concepts, and I figured this book would offer a lot more exploration and depth. It really didn't.
Mostly, it felt overlong. I enjoyed a lot of it, but it really could have been 200 pages shorter and tightened up the story a lot.
I also found myself frustrated with the way the primary villain of the series is treated. The villain announces themselves quite obviously in the first book, and then it felt like everyone kind of forgot by book two? Like they attempted to kill a bunch of royalty and steal the crown and then made a whole speech about it, and nobody was doing anything about it in this book. There was one conversation where the king was like "they apologized it's all good" and then another where Fitz was trying to decide if obvious villain was back to doing villainy things- but there's no proof so maybe it isn't them. The villain is given every chance to continue their plans and everyone acts shocked when they do. It just didn't make sense when that person very explicitly stated their intentions earlier.
I was honestly leaning toward three stars, but I really loved the climax. It was a great climax, so full of tension, and I couldn't put the book down for the last hundred pages. I read it so quickly because I was so stressed about everything that happened. I loved it so much.
And there were a lot of other things I enjoyed about this book. The writing style is still fantastic and I loved the introduction of Fitz's wolf friend. I also loved the further development of his relationship with Burrich and the exploration of the character of Kettricken.
Overall, this was a great book with a few flaws and I'm very much looking forward to continuing the series.
Mostly, it felt overlong. I enjoyed a lot of it, but it really could have been 200 pages shorter and tightened up the story a lot.
I also found myself frustrated with the way the primary villain of the series is treated. The villain announces themselves quite obviously in the first book, and then it felt like everyone kind of forgot by book two? Like they attempted to kill a bunch of royalty and steal the crown and then made a whole speech about it, and nobody was doing anything about it in this book. There was one conversation where the king was like "they apologized it's all good" and then another where Fitz was trying to decide if obvious villain was back to doing villainy things- but there's no proof so maybe it isn't them. The villain is given every chance to continue their plans and everyone acts shocked when they do. It just didn't make sense when that person very explicitly stated their intentions earlier.
I was honestly leaning toward three stars, but I really loved the climax. It was a great climax, so full of tension, and I couldn't put the book down for the last hundred pages. I read it so quickly because I was so stressed about everything that happened. I loved it so much.
And there were a lot of other things I enjoyed about this book. The writing style is still fantastic and I loved the introduction of Fitz's wolf friend. I also loved the further development of his relationship with Burrich and the exploration of the character of Kettricken.
Overall, this was a great book with a few flaws and I'm very much looking forward to continuing the series.