Hi ForeverBookers,
How are you all doing today? I hope you’re well!
I’ve just finished Assassin’s Quest by Robin Hobb, and BOY was it a ride! Things I didn’t expect to happen, happened as well as things that I didn’t necessarily had to happen to further the plot. I didn’t love this book as much as the other two. It was okay but it just wasn’t what I thought it would be. I think this is why it took me 18 days to finish! This won’t be the case for everyone, though.
2.5 Stars (3 on Goodreads)!
We’re again following Fitz, as he walks the line between being declared dead and really being alive. It’s hard for him because all he wants is to go to his pregnant girlfriend and check that she’s okay. She luckily has Burrich, Fitz’s confidante and friend who bought him up from a little boy WAY back in Assassin’s Apprentice. But Fitz has a job to do - to go and find Verity, the King-in-Waiting and get him home to take the throne and power away from Regal, Fitz’s evil uncle. Can he do it? You’ll have to read to find out!
I read this book for a few readathons again! This time, they were:
The Cardcaptor-a-thon - The Twin - Read a book that has a strong friendship element - Fitz makes a friend in Starling when he’s on his quest. They work together for the ultimate goal in the novel! (#29)
Make-Your-Myth-Taker Readathon - A book featuring an animal - Nighteyes, one of my favourite characters is Fitz’s wolf companion so this counts!
Reading Rivalry - A book that reminds you of a video game - Just the quest idea and how Fitz is unsure of practically every move he makes.
Fiction Feud Society - A yellow book - because this is LGBTQ month, and the cover has a somewhat yellowish tint!
The Detect-a-thon - Read a book containing secrets - There are LOTS of secrets revealed in “Assassin’s Quest.” We don’t get answers to all of them, though, I don’t feel! Maybe in the next books that follow Fitz we will...
Spoilers Below...
“I don’t suppose anyone has heard anything from King-in-Waiting Verity?”
Chade shook his head slowly. “King Verity,” he reminded Burrich softly. “If he were here.” He looked far away. “If he were coming back, I think he’d be here by now,” he said quietly. “A few more soft days like this, and there will be Red Ship Raiders in every bay. I no longer believe Verity is coming back.”
This clearly signifies that Chade doesn’t think King Verity is still alive. Verity, of course went off on his quest to find the Elderlings in the last book, Royal Assassin. He thought they were the only way of saving the Six Duchies from a usurper, like Regal. We, as the reader find out what’s happened to Verity in the latter half of this book. I don’t want to spoil it but let’s just say that it took a turn I didn’t expect. I didn’t enjoy the twist, as it led to fantastical plot line that just wasn’t believable to me, in terms if this book.
Nighteyes, the wolf is Fitz’s constant companion throughout “Assassin’s Quest.” He’s Fitz’s Wit-partner. I liked seeing this as it always meant he had someone to rely on when times were hard for him and there are a lot of hard times for Fitz throughout this novel...Molly not knowing Fitz is alive, Molly moving on with another man (I won’t say who but it’s someone we know,) the battles with the Coterie, Fitz not having a relationship with his daughter...and there are sooooo many more! I loved the rapport that Nighteyes had with Fitz, I was often laughing at his lines within the text, so this was one of my favourite parts.
There’s a character that wasn’t needed, I believe called Rolfe that Fitz meets on the streets on his voyage to find Verity. He has a Wit-companion in the form of a bear, Hilda. Neither character really plays a significant role. I thought Rolfe might come back into the story near the end but that was hinged on the unbelievable fantasy plot, and not what Rolfe was there for. I know fantasy isn’t meant to necessarily be believable but there was just something about this that made it a big stretch. Maybe it was the info-dump right at the end of the novel. If we’d been introduced to events that would happen earlier or in previous books, I might have preferred that, but then you lose the surprise element, which wouldn’t be for every reader, I know.
“You will be back, you know,” he added.
I shook my head slowly. “I doubt that. But I thank you for what you have given me.”
“No. I know you will be back. It is not a matter of your wanting what I can teach you. You will need it.”
From that I expected Rolfe to come back into the story and, although he could potentially come back in future books, I’m not sure he will. Rolfe would have taught Fitz what he could do with his Wit. The Wit is the magic that allows him to converse with animals, so Nighteyes, as I’ve pointed out in other reviews for this series.
As I said earlier on, the end takes a real fantastical turn. I don’t want to spoil how but one of the covers for the book might clue you in. I thought this ending was a bit of a cop out if I’m being honest. What started off as an exciting trilogy with lots of twists and turns ended in a boring, run-of-the-mill story for me. The fantasy plot just didn’t pull me in as much as the political intrigue plot did. This surprised me, as I thought I preferred fantasy to politics in my books. I might be wrong, though.
I did, however like how Molly ended up. I think Molly was perhaps my favourite character of the whole trilogy because I could really see myself in her. I think that every decision she made throughout the Farseer Trilogy, I would have made.
Other than Molly, I liked seeing Burrich again and how he protects those important to Fitz, when he can’t. I could give or take Chade in this book, the character that taught Fitz how to become an assassin. If he’d had more of a role I think I would have preferred him. But he was very much on the sidelines. This was something else I didn’t necessarily like. In books 1 and 2 we see Fitz training to become an assassin but in “Assassin’s Quest,” it’s like that is all forgotten, and Fitz has to start again with nothing. I didn’t see him use his assassin skills once in this final book of the trilogy.
Kettricken, again, I could give or take. She became a bit of a weak character towards the end of the book, unfortunately and she wasn’t even in the beginning of it. She’s meant to be Queen of the Mountain Kingdom but she just felt very two dimensional to me in Assassin’s Quest. I thought in Assassin’s Apprentice and Royal Assassin she was much more fleshed out! It’s like she didn’t care about events or if she did, she was too scared to do anything about them. Should a leader of a Kingdom be scared? In my eyes, no!
A new character we meet about half way through is Starling. She’s kind of what I wish Kettricken would have become. Starling is very sure of herself. Fitz meets Starling when he becomes part of a travelling circus like troop.
“She reminded me briefly of Molly.”
is what Fitz thinks of her when he first meets her. This might be why the book ends how it does. I won’t write how it ends but I don’t think it ends how it should, necessarily. I really hope the next books that feature Fitz do end better because this wrap up to the Farseer Trilogy really let me down.
The main plot in Assassin’s Quest SHOULD have been getting Regal off the throne. I thought that as an assassin that’s what Fitz would have done! If he had have brutally killed him, I would have liked it a lot more. But in actuality, Regal dies pretty pathetically at the end of the novel. It’s not even really said how he dies. Just that “Some say that that was why, for months afterwards, Lord Chade was seldom seen without his pet ferret.”
While this is kind of funny, I suppose, it didn’t have me on the edge of my seat as much as a brutal murder would have, for Regal. And let’s face it, he deserves only that, not to be killed by a pet ferret, as the text leads us to believe. I thought this was a cop-out ending for the author if I’m to be honest. They’d written such a great story in Assassin’s Apprentice and Royal Assassin, but they couldn’t be bothered to wrap anything up well in Assassin’s Quest is what it felt like to me.
Finally, then I’m giving Assassin’s Quest 2.5 out of 5 Stars! Believe me, this really shocks me but all in all it just wasn’t what I wanted it to be. I thought that Fitz did too much travelling and not enough pinning Regal down. For the length of the book I thought we would at least see more of Regal but we didn’t. Fitz knew he was evil from before the book started. I would have liked to have seen him and Fitz have a few scenes where they battled each other to the death, but this didn’t happen. I get that this book was about finding Verity but even that was a let down to me in the end. The fantasy elements were pretty pointless too. The only things I truly liked were Nighteyes’ relationship with Fitz and where Molly ended up as I said above It, therefore, unfortunately didn’t have much substance for me.
Stand by for my next review, coming soon!
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