Today was a crazy busy day and that is why I am not writing this until 8pm. I predict the next two weeks will be pretty crazy. This week I promise to get all the posts up on the normal days but I make no promises about what time I will post them. The week of March 21st through the 24th I can’t even promise that I will post anything at all. Anyway, I went to the library today and I checked out eight books, even though I know I will have to call and renew them, because I wanted three series that I have wanted to revisit. Two of them are connected and I think would make an excellent book blog.
Robin Hobb’s Farseer Trilogy
I have read ten Robin Hobb books consisting of three trilogies and the first book of a fourth series and all of them are connected in a fantastic world she first introduces us to in her Farseer Trilogy.
Assassin’s Apprentice is the first book in the trilogy and in it we meet the series unlikely hero (I am a sucker for an unlikely hero) and most of the cast of characters that many will span through two separate series. (One character manages to be in three series.) She also introduces the readers to the world that this and another series takes in along with the magic that this world contains.
The hero of this series is FitzChivalry Farseer, who is a bastard son of a dead favored prince. The reader meets Fitz as a little kid after he gets left to the royal family. No one really knows what to do with him so he is left to be raised by his father’s stable man, Burrich. His grandfather, King Shrewd, sees the potential tool he has in Fitz and also the potential danger inherent in having a dissatisfied bastard heir. Shrewd makes a deal with Fitz to take care of and educate Fitz in return for Fitz’s loyalty. Shrewd decides to train Fitz to be the assassin for the crown.
First, I love that the hero is a bastard and is trained in an unusual way. Most books would have Fitz (FitzChivalry, by the way, is not really a name but more of a label meaning bastard Of Chivalry) be a rightful king with his rightful throne stolen from him by some evil plot. Fitz is a bastard and Hobb unapologetically write a world that does not leave him much room to take the throne. I also love that Fitz is trained to be an assassin. It takes away any pretty veneer of polite court politics. I think it makes her books much more believable.
Second, I love the magic in this world. Robin Hobb write a world with two forms of magic and plays with the idea of a high magic and a low magic. The high magic is the magic that is supposedly linked to the Farseer royal line and it is best described as telepathy. Anyone who has this magic can see events or influence minds of people far away. They can also control the perceptions of others. The low magic is a beast magic that allows the person to “hear” what animals are thinking and develop a rudimentary connection with most animals and it also for someone with it to connect deeply with on animal allowing for a type of symbiosis with them. This magic is considered wrong and shameful. People who can develop these links are often burned at the stake. As expected, shit hits the fan when Fitz develops this magic.
My favorite thing about this trilogy, though, is the characters. Many books have a great central hero but have weak supporting characters. Robin Hobb makes her supporting characters just as memorable as Fitz. I actually am far more in love with Burrich and the Fool than I am Fitz. Burrich is Fitz’s main caretaker and his replacement father figure. He is gruff and drinks too much and sometimes has rough manners but Burrich has a heart that won’t quit. It becomes clear early on that Burrich is an honorable man that will do anything to protect and care for those he loves.
The Fool is in three of her trilogies because he is just that interesting of a character. THrough much of the Farseer trilogy he is a bit of an enigma. He is the albino court fool for King Shrewd and he seems ageless and sometimes even his gender is ambiguous. As he takes a larger part in the events around Fitz you realize that he is a lot more than he seems.
So I had planned on writing about the second trilogy that all of these characters live in but I think now, after seeing the length of this blog, that I save it for Tuesday.
Geeks a Geeking