HardcoverI was so happy to be back in Hobbs' amazing universe of dragons and liveships! Although Assassin's Apprentice is, hands-down, my favorite novel (we've bought at least a dozen copies of the paperback and given them as gifts or lent them out, never to be seen again), it had somehow escaped my notice that the first two books of a new trilogy set in that same world were on the shelves. Fortunately, my husband noticed and put them under the Christmas tree for me.
And, boy, this does not disappoint. Hobb has an amazing ability to write fantastic things matter-of-factly. Somehow, I can lose myself in the text -- my anger rises and my heart beats faster and I mutter things like "he wouldn't dare." I am every bit as caught up in her words as I can get in a well-realized film.
My only complaint (and it is truly the ONLY thing wrong) is that we literally leave the story in the middle of a scene. A dragon is dying, our heroine (well, one of them anyway) is being threatened with ruin to so she'll quickly return to the her soul-killing "proper" life, and an antagonist may have just unwittingly become more empathetic to the dragons than will be livable for him. Luckily, I own the second book...but am worried that it will leave me similarly frustrated while I wait for the third.
A+
