![]() ![]() Hobb doesn’t write action-packed fantasy, but stories driven by excellent characterization, and this book is a lot more angsty than I’m used to from her, but it worked for me. I’ve been trying to make these books last, and would only read Dragon Keeper on my commute home from work, which stretched the experience to fill up a whole month, but I read half of this one in just two days, I just couldn’t help myself. This second volume takes off right where the first one left off, and I had a really hard time pacing my own reading. I just prefer the multiple POVs, dragons, and Rain Wild setting over being inside Fitz’ head and dealing with two magic systems in the Six Duchies. This may sound like a criticism, but it’s not-I’m definitely in the minority, but I enjoyed this book far more than any book in the Tawny Man trilogy. Apparently it was supposed to be a trilogy like the others, but the first volume was split in two for publishing reasons (I assume because it would’ve clocked in at well over 1000 pages), making this the first half of book one-it shows in the pacing that never really reaches any sort of climax. It ends just as things are starting to get really interesting, but I thought the cliffhanger, while not a super torturous one like at the end of, say, Royal Assassin, was well-placed, and it made me want to jump into the next book immediately. This book is by far the least-action-packed of the Realm of Elderlings so far it pretty much only lays the groundwork for the quest for the mythical Kelsingra that’s to come, and introduces us to the inner world of the new characters. I love how immersive and organic Hobb’s characterization is-you understand their reasoning, even when you’re seeing the world through the eyes of an antagonist of sorts it’s a gift few authors are endowed with. We have five new and wildly different POV characters, all of them interesting, all of them with a distinct voice of their own. ![]() The dragons move willingly, because they share an ancestral memory of a fabled Elderling city far up the uncharted river… and if they die trying to find something that may no longer exist, along with their keepers, it would solve two of the Council’s problems. They are mostly children heavily marked by the Rain Wilds-so strongly scaled, clawed, or otherwise changed that they should’ve been left to die after birth. Tintaglia has however been gone for too long, and the Council doesn’t want to have to put up with the financial burden and sheer nuisance anymore, so they plan on having the dragons moved-with the help of volunteers they’ve recruited as keepers. And so it falls to the people of the Rain Wilds to keep them fed-part of their contract with Tintaglia, who would in turn keep Bingtown and the Rain Wilds safe from Chalcedean warships. Most died on the way, others never emerged from their cocoons or were so malformed that they died shortly after in any case, not one dragon of the few that survived their metamorphosis is in good shape they are all stunted, none can fly, some are feeble-minded. Althea, Malta, Brashen, Paragon, and Selden have very small parts, but their story has already been told it’s about a whole new, equally fascinating and fleshed-out cast of characters now.įitz and the Fool awakened the male dragon encased in ice at the end of Fool’s Fate, and this sub-series (the only one made up of four rather than three books) takes off shortly after now that Tintaglia has found a viable mate, she has all but abandoned the serpents that painstakingly made their way up the dangerous Rain Wild River to the ancient cocooning grounds. ![]() As much as I like Fitz and the Fool, the Liveship Traders trilogy was the subseries that got me hooked on Hobb’s world, and I love being back in the Rain Wilds. We’re back and deep in the uncharted Rain Wilds with a multiple POV narrative as we follow the fate of the dragons that had been brought to safety by the end of the Liveship Traders trilogy. ![]() The Rain Wild Chronicles is the fourth story-arc in the Realm of Elderlings series. ![]()
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