nico_asteri 's review for:

Assassin's Quest by Robin Hobb

4.5

adventurous challenging dark tense medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Complicated

Diverse cast of characters: Complicated

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

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Wow. I really loved this whole trilogy but it was a challenging read. Fitz never really catches a break and even though it all makes sense in the story, it's hard to see him face betrayal after betrayal, and lose so much. After I finished, my first thought was "that was one of the best series that I will never ever read again". However I will say the books are worth reading. Fitz is an interesting character and he's very consistent in his behavior. I think my favorite character aside from Fitz is probably Nighteyes or the Fool. I saw there were more books that follow the Fool and I definitely plan on reading those someday (once I emotionally recover from reading this series).

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Torture, Violence

Minor: Rape

There is a part where a character's body is taken by the Skill and used to impregnate another character. This is technically done willingly and with everyone's knowledge/consent but also the character that is taken over does not have much of a choice so it's not what I'd call enthusiastic consent. The description isn't graphic but the character is clearly bothered by his body being used in this way so while it's maybe not quite rape, it could be troubling for anyone sensitive to that kind of content.