Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

I’m Still Not Clear on How Different Wit and Skill Are

Royal Assassin by Robin Hobb

by Leave a Comment

This was heavy. I had heard Robin Hobb wrote depressing books, but I expected it to be depressing due to trauma and loss, and while the books aren’t short on those things, equally depressing is the powerlessness of Fitz. I sometimes found myself chafing at the restrictions placed upon him as someone who has both too much and too little power. As the son of a prince, he is viewed as important and maybe even a threat, but as the bastard son of a prince, […]

Book 2: Villains be villainous.

Royal Assassin by Robin Hobb

by 3 Comments

Book 2 of ??? in this year’s Robin Hobb journey! I liked this one. I didn’t like it as much as the first one, but it’s still a solid 4 stars. The Pace of Assassin’s Apprentice  felt like slow and deliberate because we were getting to know Fitz, setting up the other characters, laying groundwork for other pieces of the narrative, getting to know the lay of the land, literally. Royal Assassin felt, weirdly, a little slower to me, in a more frustrating way. Like […]

A Lonely Coming-of-Age Story

Assassin's Apprentice by Robin Hobb

by 6 Comments

I’m so glad I’m finally starting my Robin Hobb journey. There’s a book club on Fable that’s going to read one of her Realm of the Elderlings book each month until we get through the whole series, and I’m excited about it. I had heard that Hobb writes slow-paced, character-driven books, and I was a little worried about being bored, but this book helped me realize that I have been conflating “slow” and “boring,” and they’re not the same. This novel is not boring at […]

Assassin’s Apprentice: The first of many Robin Hobb books for me in 2025

Assassin's Apprentice by Robin Hobb

by 2 Comments

I devoured the Liveship trilogy last year, a series I picked up kind of on a whim. It was my favorite read(s?) of last year, so I was delighted when, immediately upon finishing the third book, I saw how many other books Robin Hobb has written. DELIGHTED. I decided to space them out so as to savor them like the delicacies that they are. I took a break for a few months and was 33% into Demon Copperhead by which, while so well written, was […]

Wah :(

Fool's Quest (Fitz and the Fool, #2) by Robin Hobb

by Leave a Comment

“I found myself speaking softly as if I were telling an old tale to a young child. And giving it a happy ending, when all know that tales never end, and the happy ending is but a moment to catch one’s breath before the next disaster.” Seriously, at this point—the middle book of a trilogy that is itself the penultimate book in a sixteen book epic saga of a series—it is virtually impossible to talk about anything in a review that won’t spoil SOMETHING, so […]

WTF cliffhanger. #CBRBINGO – Heart

Fool's Assassin (Fitz and the Fool, #1) by Robin Hobb

by Leave a Comment

Been putting off writing this review because with each book in this series, my emotions get more and more entangled and it’s basically agony to write about them because it makes me feel them all over again. Luckily, until about the last hundred pages, this book wasn’t as agony-filled as the rest of the Fitz books have been, but those last hundred pages sure make up for it. The rest of the book, though not exactly sad, was also emotionally intense. Basically, you’re signing up […]



Help Our Mission

You can donate to CBR via:

  1. PayPal
  2. Venmo