★★★★★
The Tawny Man Trilogy: Book I
Following on from my rereads of the previous two Robin Hobb trilogies, I’m now on to the third: The Tawny Man. After the wider scope of The Liveship Traders trilogy, with its large cast of characters, Fool’s Errand feels tighter, more focused and more intimate. Even on a second reading, I was gripped: this easily measures up to the best of The Farseer trilogy.
★★★½
The Liveship Traders Trilogy: Book III
In this final instalment in the Liveship Traders trilogy, we rejoin the people of Bingtown and the Rain Wilds in the aftermath of the hatching of the dragon Tintaglia, whose existence calls for a complete change of attitude. That change is required not just in the minds of the Rain Wild Traders, who will become so intrinsically linked to her iron will, but more generally in the minds of those waging war, who come to realise that, no matter how powerful they are in human terms, there are some forces they can never overcome.
★★★★
The Liveship Traders Trilogy: Book II
The second volume of The Liveship Traders trilogy kicks off with a bloody amateur amputation on board ship; and the drama barely lets up until the climax 800 pages later. Along the way, Hobb eventually allows us to see the Rain Wild Traders at first hand and begins to reveal their secrets. These offer some answers to questions arising from the first book, about serpents and dragons and wizardwood; and these answers in turn give rise to questions of their own.
The Liveship Traders Trilogy: Book I
Time to return to Robin Hobb. I’m now onto the first book of her second trilogy, The Liveship Traders. These books are set in the same world as The Farseer, a long way further south, where the trading community of Bingtown lies between Chalced and Jamaillia. Bingtown could belong to an entirely different age than the Six Duchies. Here, rather than the medievalism of The Farseer trilogy, we have trade and shipping and merchants’ colonies, with a distinctly seventeenth-century feel. The Six Duchies are mentioned occasionally, but mainly as a bitterly cold backwater (both in location and civilisation) that no one particularly wants to visit. The two trilogies aren’t completely separate, of course, but that’s something that doesn’t become obvious until a little later on, so I’m going to hold off until the next book.
★★★★ ½
The Farseer Trilogy: Book III
This third and final volume of The Farseer trilogy opens with a situation in which, frankly, things can only get better. If you haven’t read the preceding books and think you might like to do so, I warn you to tread carefully here. A great deal happens in this final novel and much of it grows out of events in the earlier books, so I might be giving away spoilers without even realising it.
★★★★ ½
The Farseer Trilogy: Book II
Sometimes, at the close of a book, you feel almost physically drained. I had forgotten, quite forgotten, exactly how tough this series is: I can’t believe I was so young when I read it before. It’s harder and more brutal by far than the work of any other author I can remember reading, even more than George R.R. Martin, who is usually referenced as the example par excellence of an author who refuses to wrap his characters in cotton wool. The miraculous thing is that it all just binds you in to the story ever more tightly. There must be few mid-series books with such a raw ending, but at least the closing mood is one of mitigated triumph.
★★★★★
The Farseer Trilogy: Book I
About a month ago, Janet asked me whether I’d ever read The Farseer trilogy by Robin Hobb and the answer is a resounding yes, though I haven’t read it for many years. This was the perfect excuse for me to return to the series, because I wanted to see whether Hobb’s work really is as good as I remember. She has cast a very long shadow over my reading life: she was the first author I dared to write to, brimming over with clumsy childish enthusiasm: to my delight, she not only acknowledged my letter but sent me some signed stickers for my books. Although I try to avoid ‘favourites’ when I talk about reading, it’s safe to say there are few stories in the world that I love more than the Farseer and Tawny Man trilogies. I was given Assassin’s Apprentice for Christmas when I was twelve years old and was almost immediately gripped by the harsh, windswept world it described and by Hobb’s endearing protagonist.
The Idle Woman 