Royal Assassin (Farseer Trilogy #2) by Robin Hobb

Fitz has survived his first hazardous mission as king’s assassin, but is left little more than a cripple. Battered and bitter, he vows to abandon his oath to King Shrewd, remaining in the distant mountains. But love and events of terrible urgency draw him back to the court at Buckkeep, and into the deadly intrigues of the royal family.
Renewing their vicious attacks on the coast, the Red-Ship Raiders leave burned-out villages and demented victims in their wake. The kingdom is also under assault from within, as treachery threatens the throne of the ailing king. In this time of great danger, the fate of the kingdom may rest in Fitz’s hands—and his role in its salvation may require the ultimate sacrifice.

-- Goodreads.com description --

Royal Assassin by Robin Hobb is the second book in The Farseer Trilogy. I enjoyed this book way more than I enjoyed Assassin's Apprentice, the first book in trilogy. I heard a lot of mixed and great reviews of The Farseer Trilogy and I heard amazing things about the trilogies after that by Robin Hobb so I decided to read them all. I didn't think Assassin's Apprentice was all that great, every time I put it down, I didn't feel the desire to start reading it again, which for me, says a lot about a book. In the end, I put it down for more than a month and read the last hundred pages or so in two days. I really liked the ending, ultimately, Assassin's Apprentice started really slow, but the ending was great, so I decided to continue on. I heard from almost every reviewer that Royal Assassin a very slow paced book and that Fitz is depressed for the first half of the book and therefore annoying. I do have to say that the main character, Fitz really annoyed me at times in both books. I like the secondary characters so much better than Fitz, which is why I enjoyed Royal Assassin more than Assassin's Apprentice despite its length because we get to see a lot more of my favourite secondary characters, like Patience and Lacey, Verity and Kettricken, Shrewd, the Fool, Burrich and Chade. I don't like Fitz all that much but this was remedied by all the secondary characters that were better developed than in the first book. Nighteyes, a new character was fantastic as well! I didn't like Molly at all, and Regal is the only character I hate, but you're meant to hate him. I really LOVE how Robin Hobb developed all the characters. The critique that it should have been shorter, I cannot deny, but I didn't mind it all that much. It could be that I didn't put this book down for in order to read others because the month of January is full of exams and Royal Assassin never gave me the feeling that I needed to know what happened right this instant. Which under the circumstances was ideal.

I didn't mind Fitz being depressed, if I didn't hear a bad review about that, I would hardly have given it a second thought. Royal Assassin could have been shorter but I didn't mind it that much either. I actually really enjoyed it, especially because of the secondary characters and their development, we even kind of get an origin story of the Fool which was confusing as was to be expected, but I loved every part of it. All things considered I gave Royal Assassin 4 out of 5 stars. I didn't mind the length all that much, however, only the last 150 pages were action-packed and I was a little bit disappointed because of that, it kind of felt like a missed opportunity to me. However, I really want to read Assassin's Quest quite soon, in fact I already ordered it last week. If you are interested in reading The Farseer Trilogy, than I recommend you pick it up, just keep in mind that the books are slow and only the endings are action-packed.

Have you read Royal Assassin or other Robin Hobb books? Or are you planning to pick them up? Let me know down below!