The Robin Hobb Collection discussion

here we go!
i'm joining as of tomorrow when i'm done with Scott Lynch (that's a strange sentence in combination with his family name ^^), but i saw David started already.

as always - however is done first, please make the next one thread!

Yay! Here we go again. I'm hooked on Nick Taylor's narration so I've gone Audible again.

Ch1 - Looks like Dutiful and Fitz are dreaming of Tintaglia as well.
Swift starts being trained by Fitz. He's a bit of a one track mind though

Ch2 - Web knows who Fitz is - who else knows then? And is Web a good guy or one of the bad guys?

prologue: this is quite the description of the catalyst. i wonder how many times more the catalyist will be beaten up and near-death.
"I was his Catalyst. The Changer. I was the stone he would set to bump time's wheels out of its rut. A small pebble can turn a wheel out of its path, he told me, but warned me that it was seldom a pleasant experience for the pebble."


ch1 - so how long will we need to wait until Nettle will become part of the game? it's clear she won't be called for, but will she not react herself?
i'm kind of hoping she'll arrive before they leave on their mission, so Nettle can still join.

ch2 - Hap you fool! After all that's been said and done, now you will give the girl your money for safekeeping.
(That sound, you just heard? that's me snorting.)

I want to think that Web is one of the good guys. He's kept Fitz's secret for a while already not wanting to approach him or get Fitz on his band wagon. I respect that.

ch3 - I think Robin Hobb did a wonderful job showcasing the discomfort between the Fool and Fitz here. I kind of wanted to look away, uncomfortable as i was just reading it.
Something tells me the Fool is still going. Somehow.

Hanne wrote: "Something tells me the Fool is still going. Somehow"

Ha ha! Yes. With the book titled Fool's Fate it would be rather anti-climactic if all he did was stay home. He can't afford to stay anyway.

Ch4 - So Swift has been lying and Fitz sends him home. I wonder if he really will go. But I don't think Fitz has thought his direct approach all the way through. If Swift tells Nettle that Master Badgerlock found out his secret and sent him home then Nettle will know Master Badgerlock is wolf boy. She may come looking for him?

Well, my computer's broken completely without warning. On the plus side, this will probably make it harder for me to avoid procrastinating about reading the book. On the minus side, it may make it more difficult for me to keep up with the discussion as we go along, though I hope not.

Then again, a bigger obstacle might be being two chapters behind after just one day...


Anyway, prologue and the first two chapters. Prologue, as mentioned, makes pretty explicit the "these books are all about torturing Fitz" thing.

Chapter one - I still can't fathom what's going on with the mysteeerious voices. And I think we see some of Fitz's unreliability as a narrator.
Fitz says he's encountered beings like this once or twice, and that once they were helpful. That seems to be him ruling out that the skill-lessons helping voice was one of these Beings (and, similarly, that voice didn't exude the incredible benignity). Yet it doesn't seem like it was Tintie either. So...? And maybe more importantly: once OR TWICE? When was the other time? Before this series began and he just didn't think to mention it? Or when? Or is he just lying/bragging to make himself seem to know more than he does, and more than they do?
And then again, he talks about how he had 'long since' decided that these Beings presented themselves differently to different people. Well, firstly that's quite a leap for a guy whose only met one of these things, and only once, and knows nothing about them (and the idea that Fitz might leap so easily to thinking "oh, clearly it just felt motherly and loving because of my own fundamental anxiety of maternal deprivation!" certainly makes us think about his psychology a little differently...). And then again: long since? Even assuming that he's exaggerating and he just means sometime since the incident on Others Island (how long ago was that, do we remember?), that means he's put some serious thought into that sometime, and we didn't get to see it.
Finally, on unreliability: first Fitz says that neither he nor Chade thought much of the notion that they would actually be killing an ice-buried dragon, and that they both thought the Skill would be useful for the real mission, negotiating a face-saving way out of the quest. But then Fitz says that HE didn't think they'd actually be killing a dragon, but that Chade DOES think they will be. Did Hobb make a mistake, or was Fitz lying to us or to himself?

In the second chapter: it's good to see Golden again, at his most urbane. One thing in re-reading this trilogy is that this time around I've been able to see Golden as a more independent character, rather than just the Fool in disguise... I think the reader is in Fitz's shoes with that, at least the first time around, in that no matter how much Golden protests that he's as real as the Fool was, we still keep thinking that he's 'really' the Fool. But on re-reading, I'm getting a better sense of Golden as a real person, and how that person could easily be another aspect not only of the Fool, but also of Amber. It's not necessarily a particularly flattering side, either. It can be worth remembering that although the Fool is the hero, that doesn't necessarily make him all that nice a person. All three personas have shown flashes of narcissism, hedonism, spitefulness and arrogance. It's to Hobb's credit that she doesn't shy away from letting her characters have unappealing aspects to their personalities - though of course they're less obvious in Farseer and Tawny Man, because we see through Fitz's overwhelmingly-biased eyes.

Oh, and going back to the Prologue: how significant that Fitz calls him "the White Prophet", and only calls him "the fool" at the end, and in lower case? The White Prophet seems a much less benign figure than the Fool does - and does it also show some acceptance that the Fool was only a guise of the Prophet? Then again, is the Prophet also only one guise among many?

I do have one problem, however. Fitz thinks about how far Golden has fallen, and how parents have begun to recall their children to avoid them getting corrupted by Golden. But how long has it been? It makes it almost sound like it's just happened in the last week. How long has it been since the end of the last book, do we know, and how long before that did Golden start going off the rails?

[And is it just me, or did Golden's supernatural youth, wit and urbanity, and tendency to collapse into decadence and depravity, make anyone else think of Dorian Grey?]

I also like, by the way, the way that Fitz can't think of his friend in too negative a light, and in particular doesn't dare think of him sexually. He just assumes very easily that all these exotic people spending the night with the Fool must just be agents from 'his friends in the south'. Which they may be - probably at least some of them are. But they certainly needn't be - Golden enjoys narcotics and alcohol and good food and excessive gambling and the company of beautiful people - why shouldn't he/she also enjoy sex, with a wide variety of partners? Iirc there was a hint once about the Fool having been 'friends' with someone other than Fitz. Amber never seemed particularly sexual, but again I seem to remember her hinting that she might be (though that might just be her objecting to others making assumptions about her) - and certainly she seems to have shown a totally different side of herself to Jek (Jek certainly doesn't think Amber is non-sexual). Fitz tries to explain away Golden's interest in both SybilSydel (hello Dorian!) and Civil as just a deceit - which it was - but to me it read like quite honest interest, even if it was displayed for dishonest reasons. So I think it's quite possible that rumour is right and that Golden is indeed getting it on with a long line of girls and boys in his pleasure-palace; Fitz, of course, can't cope with either the idea that the Fool isn't an asexual, unthreatening, introvert with intimacy issues that would preclude any sexual relationship, OR with the idea that the Fool's life isn't entirely dedicated to Fitz himself (perhaps because Fitz's own life is so devoid of any serious (or even non serious) relationships (sexual or otherwise) - six books in and fitz literally doesn't have a friend in the world other than the Fool.

I agree that Fitz is in many ways an unreliable narrator because of how often he gets things wrong and by how much he seems to forget. It's brought out when he sees his younger charges like Dutiful and Swift differently to how he saw himself at that age when we get his younger POV in the Farseer trilogy


Wastrel wrote: "I do have one problem, however. Fitz thinks about how far Golden has fallen, and how parents have begun to recall their children to avoid them getting corrupted by Golden. But how long has it been? "

Well there was that incident in book one where he was cracking on to Civil's intended and then onto Civil himself when he and Fitz were looking for Dutiful. That might have done it. That was a deliberate ploy to get them kicked out of the Brasinga keep and the Fool seemed to like the idea that it would give him a seedy reputation that would increase his mystique. But also I get the impression that he has been living it up for many weeks at least and Fitz is appalled at what he sees as out of character behaviour

Wastrel wrote: "And then again, he talks about how he had 'long since' decided that these Beings presented themselves differently to different people. "

Maybe he concludes that because Tintaglia keeps changing shape and because Nettle seems to be able to affect Tintaglia's shape when she ejects her from the dream?


Wastrel wrote: "But then Fitz says that HE didn't think they'd actually be killing a dragon, but that Chade DOES think they will be. Did Hobb make a mistake, or was Fitz lying to us or to himself?"

I think Chade believes they will be excavating and beheading a dead dragon at most. So he doesn't believe they will actually be killing it. He believes from various accounts that people may have witnessed the being but he doesn't think it's alive.

Wastrel wrote: "When was the other time? Before this series began and he just didn't think to mention it? Or when? Or is he just lying/bragging to make himself seem to know more than he does, and more than they do? "


There was the time when he and Dutiful traveled through the skill pillars in Fool's Errand and they nearly got swept away and something helped them then. Then there was the time last book when Nettle was crying because Swift had taken off and Fitz had told her he was coming back with Burrick - at the end of that Skilling there is a female voice which I think might have been Tintaglia.

But Fitz knows that Tintaglia isn't the Benign Being, or anything like it - neither Fitz nor Dutiful show any confusion between the two.

Wastrel wrote: "But Fitz knows that Tintaglia isn't the Benign Being, or anything like it - neither Fitz nor Dutiful show any confusion between the two."

Yes, but I'm only guessing that the voice in the Nettle dream was Tintaglia. I don't get that from Fitz's POV - I could be wrong but I think that was before the Bingtown traders learned of the other dragon - so if that's the case then it would explain why Tintaglia was more benign then than when she finds out there's a potential mate that is in danger of beheading.

But in any case, Fitz doesn't know what to make of many of the voices and seems to forget them unless a deliberate effort is made to remember - so I wouldn't trust his POV.

First of all, I like the comparison with Dorian Gray. :)

Then more to the point, yes, Fitz is a remarkably unreliable story teller. And yet I think Robin Hobb is steering this brilliantly.
We start this trilogy thinking of Golden als the Fool is disguise, yet somewhere in the end of book 2 i noticed how she started describing "Nor the Fool, nor Lord Golden were present" and similar things, prompting us nicely to start thinking of them as different beings. And then by throwing Golden of the bandwagon it of course becomes more clear.

The timeline is not very clear, however i thought 1 or 2 months passed since those accidents. We are now early spring as we had spring fest, and i thought the last book ended somewhere early winter. But the latter bit might just be unfounded impression. (I do not offer proof :))

Agree on the dragon. She was nice and amused before she found out through Selden about this dragon slaying quest. Since then she's becoming a bit more 'angry'.

ch4 - Swift, swift, swift... I like the lad, but then i really don't. He's only ten! I kind of thought of him as being a few years older than that. He sure has character, but with Burrich and Molly as parents he was bound to get an overdose of character


ch5 - Felt very sorry for Thick here, skilling all his mysery around.

ch 3 - Fool seems to be being played up as dangerous. That story about Hoquin was NOT flattering to the white prophets.

Swift. So annoying. [And I don't buy him as 10, even in their culture, he really feels like a teenager]

ch 4 - wonder if I've found a mistake. Nettle talks about having made some money helping with THE Gloissons' lambing.
...which looks like the only instance of a surname in the series?

Hmmm - is it a surname or a small town? But I think there are surnames, at least for nobility or maybe large family goups - eg Civil Bresinga and then there's Farseer.

David Sven wrote: "Hmmm - is it a surname or a small town? But I think there are surnames, at least for nobility or maybe large family goups - eg Civil Bresinga and then there's Farseer."

Oh, yes, for the ruling classes, yes. Although even there, I think 'Bresinga' is the first surname other than 'Farseer'? Everyone else is just 'Celerity of Bearns' or 'Celerity, daughter of Duke [Brawndy, is it?]'.
True, there's Molly Chandler, but she's Molly the daughter of the Chandler, and Starling Birdsong is Starling who sings like a bird - fairly transparent epithets, rather than true surnames. Similarly, although 'Farseer' is obviously a surname, it's also clearly derived from a descriptive epithet that's just been passed on to the children. Whereas 'Gloisson' and 'Bresinga' seem to be modern surnames with no clear meaning.

(and continuing that conversation, suddenly there's burst of surnames...)

ch.5 -
I didn't like Webb the first time, because I thought the character seemed too simplistic. He's always being good, and honest, and wise.
This time, though, I think I see the purpose of him. This trilogy is re-examining the Farsee trilogy, and one of the key things about the earlier books is what Fitz is made into: a creature of shadows and deception. Not just as an assassin, but every aspect of his life is shrouded in lies and secrets.
The whole bittersweet ending of that trilogy, indeed, isn't 'natural' at all, but only the outcome Fitz has chosen by lying - for him, the solution wasn't to expose the truth, but to try to find the right combination of lies and secrets that would make things right.

In this trilogy, that's confronted, and we're forced to examine how secrets and lies can damage and hurt. Webb is at the forefront of this, not just because he shows the alternative, but more importantly perhaps because he casts the light that shows the shadows Fitz and Chade have become.

How do we see this? Just mention Webb to Chade! You can tell the old man is driven nearly mad with frustration because he can't work out Webb's agenda, what he's trying to subtly communicate, what he's trying to hide and from whom... a dishonest man never looks more dishonest than when he's trying to work out how an honest man is stealing from him. The idea that Webb is just plain and straightforward and has no particular agenda beyond trying to persuade people to be nice, by talking to them, would seem as ludicrous to Chade as the Fool's talk about saving the dragons.

Wastrel wrote: "a dishonest man never looks more dishonest than when he's trying to work out how an honest man is stealing from him. The idea that Webb is just plain and straightforward and has no particular agenda beyond trying to persuade people to be nice, by talking to them, would seem as ludicrous to Chade as the Fool's talk about saving the dragons."

Great observation

(Okay, this is the third time I've tried to post, so if this doesn't work, I'll just join in the next thread...)

I love the unreliable narrator technique. When it's done well (like Hobb does), it adds so many layers to the story.

Even though it took 100+ pages to get to the sea voyage, it didn't feel like that long. The scenes with the Fool make me a little sad but none more so than when he's being denied entry to the ship and he believes Fitz will intervene for him. (Not that I think he won't get there somehow...) I want things to be good between them again!

I like Web. I feel like he's a "good guy" and he seems to genuinely care about fostering understanding between people. He makes it a point to let Fitz know that he knows Fitz's identity but doesn't threaten him in any way. Fitz's apprehension is totally in his own mind (and, clearly, very much in Chade's mind). I'm liking Chade less and less in this trilogy, even though I can sympathize with his position.

I'm also impressed with how much characterization Hobb works into the relatively short scenes/dreams with Nettle. I really want them to meet in person!

On to Chapter 6!

Lindsey wrote: "I'm also impressed with how much characterization Hobb works into the relatively short scenes/dreams with Nettle. I really want them to meet in person!"

Me too. But I'm really want him to see Molly again - somehow.

David Sven wrote: "Lindsey wrote: "I'm also impressed with how much characterization Hobb works into the relatively short scenes/dreams with Nettle. I really want them to meet in person!"

Me too. But I'm really want him to see Molly again - somehow."

I'm ambivalent on this. It sounds all fairy tale-ish but I also feel like that in real life they would both have moved on (plus, the whole "she's married to another man he respects" thing). Hobb hasn't pulled punches in this regard before so I'm hoping for something realistic.

Wastrel wrote: "How do we see this? Just mention Webb to Chade! You can tell the old man is driven nearly mad with frustration because he can't work out Webb's agenda, what he's trying to subtly communicate, what he's trying to hide and from whom... a dishonest man never looks more dishonest than when he's trying to work out how an honest man is stealing from him. The idea that Webb is just plain and straightforward and has no particular agenda beyond trying to persuade people to be nice, by talking to them, would seem as ludicrous to Chade as the Fool's talk about saving the dragons"

I'm with you on that one! i got very irritated with Fitz not trusting Webb, i kind of wanted to shout at Fitz to stop being so distrustful. :)

Lindsey wrote: "(Okay, this is the third time I've tried to post, so if this doesn't work, I'll just join in the next thread...)

I love the unreliable narrator technique. When it's done well (like Hobb does), it..."

First of all. superagree with the unreliable narrator technique. it can go wrong on so many levels, but Robin Hobb seems to have quite the handle on it.

Chade... bah. not liking him a lot either right now.

Next, the question of Nettle.
Originally i thought the majority of this book would be about the journey to slay the black dragon. But i don't think it will be, because she has to address the Nettle-situation. She's making a huge point of how strong Nettle is, which means Nettle will probably become a key player of how this situation will be resolved, and i think as long as she isn't there physically that will be challenging.

Originally i thought Nettle would come when Thick song-skilled to everyone on the planet. But she isn't there yet, so i guess they'll go back to Buckkeep halfway the book and close the story there.

I do hope she'll surprise me on the story flow though!