Summaries and Customer Reviews are supplied by Amazon.com

Average Customer Rating:

one of my all time favourites

Customer Rating:

Robin Hobb is certainly on of the best fantasy writers out there. I have read both the Farseer trilogies(Farseer and Tawny Man ) as well as the Liveship Traders and also the Soldier son trilogy. Beautifully written - it is fantasy that does not lean on clichés 90 percent of the time. Robin creates real characters that grows on you within a completely believable world and a very interesting and fresh type of magic. This is the kind of Fantasy novel that got me hooked on the genre.

90% feelings-10% action

Customer Rating:

Having read so many positive reviews I bought the 3 books.....what a shame ! The idea for the books a fine, but Ms Hobb puts feeeeelings in everywhere...the plot becomes tidious and nothing is happening without describing more feelings...in the end I "speed read" - one page in every 30 and at last, towards the end, hoped some action without feeling and some explanation to the plot story was given...I was wrong. So I don't get the hype about this series. Nothing close to just one page of Tolkien. On the other hand. If you like caracters that expresses feelings all the time, do not fight (very short and none-gory fights here in the books)and just can't get their act together - this series is for you.

Refreshing, original fantasy

Customer Rating:

I found Assasssins Apprentice, and the rest of the trilogy, a very refreshing read. The pace does begin a little slow and at times I felt Robin Hobbs did not have to go to the extremes she did to portray Fitz's utter loneliness, however after about chapter six I found the pace picked up and I was hooked into the book. This is not a typical 'epic quest' based fantasy tale, Hobb does a great job of avoiding most of the cliches and stereotypes rife in the fantasy genre, although admittedly the antagonist can be a little flat at times in the typical 'bad guy' way. However, overall I think this book is worth reading just for Hobbs' skill in creating deep, dynamic characters that grow with the story. I felt a little distant from most of the characters in the book at first, I think this is a clever reflection on the state of mind of young Fitz in his loneliness, however by the second book I had grown to love them - the characters are all so rounded and realistic, with their own histories, opinions and faults. Hobbs' use of language also impressed me, she has a lovely style of writing that is very descriptive without being over-indulgent, giving the story an overall feel of 'realness' that sucks the reader into the world of Buckkeep and the Six Duchies.

A brilliant read.	Customer Rating:
I am not the biggest fan of reading and don't read particularly often but I loved this book It did have quite a slow start but once it had started it was brilliant I couldn't put it down. Don't think about buying it just BUY IT!

Atmosphere, Character

Customer Rating:

The words in the subject seem to be Hobb's forte. She is unrivalled in the fantasy genre for both. She creates a completely believable quasi mediaeval world without resorting to mind numbing realism or conceited grittiness, and also manages to include enough beauty and magic for it to be intriguing to jaded Fantasy readers. The magic system could have been cliched - it is not. There are real costs and dilemmas attached to the two magics in the book. You will not find fireballs or lightning bolts here. It is a dark tale with troughs of despair and strife warring against the brief peaks of happiness that the protagonist is allowed. The events and situations we find in the book are both logical and poignant due to the expertly painted characters - if Fitz, the Assassin's Apprentice of the title, is in a dangerous situation, it really matters because Hobb has made the character matter to us. The same goes for secondary characters: even minor characters are written with a style and care that most novelists would not consider. This is not to say that one will find lengthy passages about the workday of a cook that Fitz happens to see occasionally, no, Hobb can delineate and sculpt an impression of a character with a few well chosen lines, lines that can linger long in the memory. I have not mentioned the plot. This is not a summary, but an explanation of the 5 stars at the top of this review.