Assassin's Quest

Robin Hobb

Homicide: Life on the Street was for many years the best show on televison, hands down. Brilliant acting, brilliant direction, compelling plots that spanned episodes (one of which went the whole series, from the very first to the very last episode) without ever degenerating into the world of soap opera. It was almost inevitable, really, that Homicide would jump the shark, and it did so by cutting a major plotline short; after Pembleton (Andre Braugher, one of film and television's brightest-shining lights) had a stroke at the end of one season, they opened the next season with his struggle to get back into the world after being released form this hospital. For one episode. After that, he was back to his old self with a few extra quirks, which seemed almost as if the scriptwriters had tossed them in as afterthoughts to make sure everyone remembered Pembleton had a stroke.

Assassin's Queststarts off by jumping the shark in the same way. Fitz, left at the end of Assassin's Quest the same way Pembleton was left at the end of season four of Homicide, spends the first few pages doing exactly the same thing. While he spends longer getting back into the ways of the world than Pembleton did, ultimately the thread is dropped (again, except for a few afterthought-like pieces). I got wary right about then. Five hundred pages later, Hobb started tying up all the series' loose ends, and everything got tied up far too neatly, almost to the point of deus ex machina. Another piont against the book.

The intervening five hundred pages, though, are prime Hobb, and while the book's two flaws above are major ones, they shouldn't necessarily keep you from having a fine time with this, especially if you've read the first two in the series. Fitz finally gets around to setting out after his two main objectives, the assassination of Regal and the finding of Verity, getting into various minor adventures along the way. All of which is quite fun and reminiscent of the first two books. What seems to be missing from book three is the intrigue. Granted, it's hard to have court intrigue when you're tramping through the woods, but it was part of what made the first two novels so pleasurable, and it feels like an empty space crying out for something else to fill it here.

It's good, but it pales in comparison to the first two in the series.