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Reviewed by: Kim
Rating: 10/10
Genre: Fantasy
752 pages/1997
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Royal Assassin
by
Robin Hobb
This book is the second book in Robin Hobb's Farseer Trilogy which began with Assassin's Apprentice. It continues the story of FitzChivalry, the bastard son of the King-in-Waiting of a kingdom called the Six Duchies. The relentless Red Ship raiders continue to raid the coastal duchies, the King is old and ailing, the King-in-Waiting and his new Queen-in-Waiting are having a tough time in their marriage, and the youngest Prince has designs to overthrow them all and take the crown for his own.
This book pulled me in and wouldn't let go. It was 750 pages of I-can't-put-this-down, nearly to the exclusion of all else. It was told entirely in the first person through Fitz's eyes, and Fitz is intelligent enough and explains enough of his thought process that although I might not have always agreed with his actions, I at least always understood why he was doing them. The rest of the characters in the book, and there are lots of them, are also very deep, three-dimensional characters. The motivation behind the bad guys was even sufficiently explained to elicit a twinge of pity for them, too. The only characters who weren't explained were supposed to be mysteries, and they added as much to the story as everyone else.
The language used by the author was the perfect level for my enjoyment. It wasn't simplistic nor was it overly complicated. I didn't need a dictionary to read this book. While I was reading this book I was in Fitz's world.
The best part of the book, though, was the plot. I rarely guessed what was going to happen next. There were twists and turns aplenty and when I wondered what the point of mentioning a certain thing was, it almost always turned out to be important later. Many things happened in this book and the action never stopped.
At the end of this book the entire plot is still basically up in the air. Not a single plot line is wrapped up. As the book is ending the action is going fast and furious and it feels like it just stopped to take a short breather. Even though nothing is concluded, the ending still feels natural and I felt like it could be the end of the story entirely. Luckily for us, it's not. The next book in the trilogy is Assassin's Quest.
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