r/robinhobb

Two books left :( :

Bee is taken by the Servants after barely saving Shun. Nice going Bee! I think she’s going to benefit loads as a character by being on her own.

Fitz back to his machinations in court… god I miss prime scheming Fitz era.

The Fool and Fitz sharing injuries… explains Bee’s existence, and how close the two of them biologically are now… very interesting.

Not much to say on these early chapters, just tons of set up and positioning.

Well… the both of them being so mixed and talking through it does really add up when you recall just now many insanely shared experiences they’ve had.

Fitz meets with Kettricken and Web… TO TALK ABOUT BONDING WITH A CROW? This could be very interesting, I could not imagine a more perfect animal for Fitz other than Nighteyes!

Hobb has pulled some really left field ideas out of no where in this final trilogy.

Riddle and Nettle are having a baby! Cool.

I like this crow situation a lot, I think it’s a really interesting idea.

HOLY FUCKING SHIT. Fitz is fully outed in front of the entire Six Duchies… and is WELCOMED A HERO.

A LETTER FROM JEK ON KELSINGRA AND SILVER WELL… TO WHO?! RAPSKAL MENTION! THIS IS WHAT IVE WANTED FROM FINAL TRILOGY BOOKS, LETS MIX THESE WORLDS UP

This crow being slightly white…. Keeps saying ‘white’….. HHHHMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

Wow. Unbelievably emotional letter from Verity, declaring Fitz would have been King in another life. If it hadn’t been so many books without him, Verity could have been a Top 10 character once upon a time!

A letter from ‘The Apprentice’ talking about secretly befriending The Fool… Ash? Who are u really! What do you mean the Fool will probably figure out ur true guise before Fitz does!

I still hate what Hobb has done to the Fool so fucking much.

Hello, tonight I finished Assassin's Apprentice on my way through Realm of the Elderlings for the first time. I wanted to share some of the theories I had while I read through the first book! Please no spoilers for future books! I love reading of people's first read throughs, so I will share my ideas below.

My first crackpot theory was that Burrich was actually Chivalry, and that when "Burrich" had his leg wounded that was Chiv being maimed so they decided to switch places. My evidence was that Burrich was acting incredibly paternally to Fitz.

I also had a number of time travel theories. Namely that Chade was a version of Fitz from the future, and that Burrich was Chivalry in the future. Burrich's sadness when Chiv dies was him mourning his future self. There was a line when Fitz met Lady Tine that went "Lady Tine travels" and my ears perked up, tine travel, time travel. When I heard this this confirmed it for me!!

The only alive theory I have is that Burrich and Chivalry had some unrequited love somewhere, probably Burrich crushing on Chiv.
I have no idea who or what the Fool is. They seem very important, obviously. If I had to guess, it'd be that the Fool is some sort of creature of the Elderlings or someone who touched a bigger more power magic and was left with a learning disability or something.

I don't understand what Fitz's magical significance is, the relevance of the Elderlings, the relevance of animals and nature in the rest of the story. It seems to be a budding theme, especially in the final chapters.

The Forged are also interesting, they seem lobotomised magically, very zombie-like. I don't know where there story will go, hopefully not as just goons for our protagonists to slay

I'm also excited to see how THE SKILL and THE WIT grow. I'm sure there's other genetic magic's somewhere doing somethings! Like Chade's pocket dimension room

A general plot progression idea is that Fitz is on track to raze the outer island and become like an evil usurper, eventually taking the throne for himself at the end of the Farseer Trilogy, and the rest of the books looks back on his life, potentially even a late-game redemption arc?

I am excited to see more of Molly. Excited to see Shrewd's reckoning, he seems to sow sour seeds and have a cruel sense of morality. I hope Verity succeed's Shrewd, but I think Fitz will. Verity is too soft and Regal is an ass.

Hello everyone!

First of all, I want to clarify thatI tagged this as spoilers, but there will be only a few lines quoted here, for the purpose of giving examples and context whenever needed to some of the issues this post is about.

Now, to the main point: Robin Hobb's ROTEL had been out of print for a while in Spain (it's been about 10 years since the Tawny Man series was published there), and late 2024 it was announced by the publisher Nocturna Ediciones that Farseer was getting picked up for a revised translation (put a pin on that...) and would be published in 2025. On december of 2025, they also shared an announcement confirming new editions of Liveship.

Now, this was fantastic news for sure! Nocturna is also a pretty stablished publisher and they also publish other stablished fantasya and sci-fi authors like Neal Shusterman, Jay Kristoff, Christelle Dabos and many national authors, so it was initially quite reasuring that out of all the options they were the ones chosen by Hobb and her team.

The Farseer trilogy was published in 2025, and though the price was not ideal for a paperback (around 22-25€ per book) and it did spark some debate, people were mostly happy with the revised translation.

Fast-forward to this week, when we finally got Liveship. The price already raised a lot of concerns (25-26€ per paperback, here's a link where you can check some of the respones by the community), but there is a larger issue that is -rightfully so-, creating an outrage: the so called "revised translations" are, in fact, not revised or done with very little care.

These are some examples of the things spotted so far by some readers in the first few hundred pages (most can be found in this thread on X and its replies):

- Wintrow's age was mistranslated as 30 instead of 13, just like it happened in the 1990s editions

- Chapter 9: translated "the crunching of shod feet on the sandy rocks" as "the crunch of the wet snow on sandy rocks"

- Multiple cases of "her/him/it" used incorrectly (like refering to a female character with male pronouns/articles)

- There are up to 4 different translators working on the same book. I can't say for certain to what extent this may have impacted the quality of the translation, but it is definitely not common practice to have more than one or two and really makes you wonder if something went wrong considering all the details mentioned above.

- Awful paper quality, making it even hard to read some pages due to how the print on the other side is showing through.

Again, this is a 26€ paperback with revised translations. It is diabolical to get the license to such a wonderful world and treat it like this. So far, as of May 19th Nocturna has not aknowledged any of these issues.

I am really hoping we can give this some traction here and in social media, so that hopefully miss Hobb and her team get to see how big the negative reaction is to how they're treating the series so many people love. Let's get some justice for the Spanish-speaking folks.

Thanks for taking your time reading until here!

editing for clarity: this is not a post made just so Hobb can mayyybe find out (i know there are official ways to reach her and her team) but more of an informative post to hopefully bring this to attention of the ROTEL community to show some support by spreading awareness.

edit 2: as of morning of May 21st (EU time) these issues are still not adressed by the publisher

I am currently on the 2nd Liveship Traders book (only half way through The Mad Ship, so no spoilers for further than that please!) & I just wanted to mention something that Hobb does that I feel many other fantasy authors miss out on. Hobb’s characterisation is obviously superb, but what makes it stand out for me is not only how richly complex the characters are, but how each of their actions absolutely make sense for them to do.

Other fantasy books will have intriguing characters, but their actions are sometimes forced in order to serve the plot or move things on. I’ve found when reading more modern fantasies that characters will make decisions that are completely left field or just pointless in order to cause tension.

Whereas Hobb tends to make the plot follow these characters through life, whilst interweaving a continuous overarching plot (Maulkin & the Serpents and The Elderling Cities) throughout each of the trilogies. It just makes for much more engaging reading as well as makes these characters completely come alive I think! It also allows you to love/hate character like Kennit even more, because you deeply understand everything he is doing.

I also want to add - I feel like Hobb not only chooses actions for the characters that make sense, but they are also actions that feel unique. I dont necessarily expect everything, but I understand when it happens. So few authors are able to capture that level of understanding and I think it’s what makes Hobb stand out amongst a lot of the fantasy on the bookshelves!

What do you think?

So I’m on a reread of RoTE and I’m now on chapter 3 of Fools Fate

This is the scene where the skill link is used between the fool and Fitz. There is the whole scene where fitz says it’s too much, no one should be able to love someone that much. Then after that the fool says he’s learnt enough - when I first read this line, I thought it was that he learnt of the plan to leave him behind when they go to slay icefyre, now I know otherwise.

I struggle to understand subtext sometimes, and usually asks friends but no one has read these books yet. What did he mean?

I knew it was coming and it didn’t make it hurt any less. Fitz. How. How could this be!!??? Going into this series and the title of this book I was convinced that our boy was going to die and it felt cemented when we got bees POV. But as I was reading I was hoping and praying that I would be wrong. I actually feel like I just lost a friend.

I thought it was done well. Fitz and the fool getting one last private moment together and Fitz healing him with the last of his strength so he would die rather than have to burn and drown. AND NIGHTEYES BEING THERE. all of it was just so heart breaking.

I feel tortured by these books.

More thoughts to come once I’m done with it all but I just need to put these feelings somewhere where people will understand me. I love Fitz i can’t believe he’s gone

“How is the hunting where you are?

It will be better with you.

I’m coming to you, my brother”

♥️

Been relistening to the Realm of Elderlings books, and when listening to the original trilogy, had a question come up (sorry for vagueness and lack of names, it was a couple months ago and just remembered).

When Verity is building and refitting ships to defend the coast, there was one ship that Fitz mentions as defecting from defending the Duchies and the ship/crew turning pirate down south. Do we ever see any inkling of this ship or crew again in either of the Bingtown/Elderling series? Couldn’t remember explicitly (been years since I read the first time) and was curious if anyone made any connection.

Only mention of any Six Duchies people in the Liveship Trader series I can recall is Amber and Jek, and I don’t recall any insinuation whatsoever that Jek may have been on that ship’s crew originally.

So I’ve just recently started Robin Hobb this year and I fell in love with her character writing. I loved the Farseer trilogy and how she wrote these nuanced characters so well with such emotion and precision it’s unbelievable.

I just recently decided to start The Liveship Traders trilogy and I’m only roughly 300 pages in and I’m so sick to my stomach. I feel sick,uncomfortable, awkward, sad, and I feel like I’m going to throw up in my mouth a little bit. She writes these characters, emotions so well, so in depth, so humanly flawed with such realism it makes me feel so much emotion. I’m supposed to be reading a BOOK, so why does it feel I’m witnessing actual people talking, arguing, and feeling true genuine human emotions from these characters. Books aren’t supposed to be this realistic my god.

It’s like when you go over to a friends house and their parents are arguing, yelling while you just stand there watching the whole thing unable to do anything. That’s exactly how it feels reading Robin Hobb, you are exactly there, able to sense and feel the emotions from each character as they each show their weakness and human flaws but you don’t have the ability to interfere.

She writes characters so well it makes me sick to my stomach lmfao, I will continue reading but this realism is making me SO uncomfortable but also in awe. Books are so awesome and when you encounter authors like Robin Hobb, it makes books so much fun.

Sometimes I think of songs that have movie end credits vibes or tv show intro vibes. Y'know, as a way to emotionally cope.

And yeah I'm aware of the song literally written about Fitz by Within Temptation (Hand of Sorrow if you wanna check it out)

But I've found myself more drawn to upbeat songs that have this kind of hype factor or resolution kind of feel, as a kind of fun contrast to the bittersweet feeling Robin's endings often leave us with lol

Here are some I associate with ROTE:

Assassin's Apprentice - Run by Delta Rae (to me this is peak fantasy vibes)

Royal Assassin - Brother by Matt Corby (surely needs no explanation)

Assassin's Quest - I'd Go With You Anywhere by Birds of Tokyo

Ship of Magic - Black Fingernails, Red Wine by Eskimo Joe (more of an intro vibe to me but yeah)

Fool's Errand - Who Are You, Really? by Mikky Ekko

That last one is really hitting for me right now. But what are some others?

I just finished the rain wilds chronicles and mostly found it to be the most boring series in ROTE. Wasn’t quite as bad as it was described but tbh I probably wouldn’t have bothered finishing it if it wasn’t ROTE.

I am a little confused though as this series seems to suggest that freeing icefyre didn’t matter and that the fools future was bound to happen regardless of what they did. I may be missing something but to me this series seemed to make the wider effects of tawny man pointless. Tantaglia doesn’t even end up staying with icyfyre and gets a new mate. I’m mostly just here to ask what I’m missing because I don’t see how the actions of Fitz and dutiful even matter is the wider scope of the world.

I am doing this for the first time ever about any of these books, as for the first time ever I have so many conflicting detailed thoughts that I genuinely believe a full review is the only way to fully and constructively communicate my emotions. 

I want to acknowledge a few things: yes, to some this may seem dramatic and indulgent, but these books are everything to me and have taken up a year of my life, so they mean a heck of a lot to me and I want to honour Hobbs hard work by showing my emotions freely. Secondly, I will say overall this is my least favourite book in ROTE and I have, within less than 24 hours, accepted that this is okay. After 13 consecutive books that I consider to be at bare minimum a 9 or actually flawless 10's, I hope people can remember that despite the tone of negativity I am probably going to strike in this review, this is still the best fantasy series I have read in my life and in my all time favourite fiction category. I am a Realm Of The Elderlings fanboy till I die, no matter what. Lastly, thanks to West Coastal and Saintfed for helping me organise my thoughts and giving great insight into the story!

Now thats out the way, Lets go through the positives, the negatives and then the constructive critisicms. 

Positives : I admire truly Hobb's bravery to introduce another 1st person POV with the addition of Bee. That takes REAL balls, and ultimately I think it paid off and gave a real interesting insight into interacting with Fitz from a 3rd person perspective. I look forward to watching Bee grow, she has real potential and is as good an addition as we could have asked for in a final trilogy. Following on, Riddle absolutely SHONE in this book. I love how in each trilogy of every book you could pick a character out that has no right to be as good as they are with the screen time/ lack of POV they get and yet somehow, Hobb makes u absolutely adore them and beg for them to stick around. Again, the mystery here is great, Hobb is so good at making things feel portentous and epic, I ESPECIALLY loved all the dream sequences and how we gleaned what The Fools life has been like via Bees dreams. Lastly, I will always love Hobbs prose, writing and general vibe, and this does not deviate. 

Negatives: Okay. Strap in. Fundamentally I have 2 major flaws here and in my mind they are so major that they irrevocably harmed my overall opinion in this book to the point I couldn't see past them. First: from almost page one to the end, it did not feel like FitzChivalry Farseer at all. Like, at all. Ignoring a messenger turning up at his house? Letting 3 random people in with little care? Stabbing The Fool immediately upon seeing him holding Bee with no context? Bee out loud word for word recites prophetic events that are upcoming, just like The Fool would, and Fitz doesn't even react or acknowledge it ONCE? WTF ! Thats not even 'god Fitz makes bad decisions' as some community like to pin on Fitz, thats just genuinely not in the heart and soul of the character. Any decision Fitz has made in the past, like his infamous public assassination in Royal Assassin, in my mind felt totally vinddicated. This did not. 

My second biggest problem, which arguably upset me as much or even more than the first, is everything pertaining to The Fool. WTF Hobb. In Fools Fate, everything that happened to the Fool felt like a culmination of every word Hobb had written. It felt honest, it felt justified and in a heartbreaking way, ultimately beautiful in how his pain helped culminate the story. THIS however. What did we gain! 15 years worth of the most insane torture describable, when already the last time we left Fool was fresh off a torturing in FF... this felt vulgar and unearned. Not only is it unbelievably distressing to read as it feels ultimately pointless (torturing the Fool for a plot hook? Really?) it did not fit with the prior 500 pages... we just spent the entire book dithering about at Withywoods to turn up at a random village and have a mutilated Fool be stabbed. This felt soooo left field, so unfitting with the rest of the story and just so... unnecessary. It felt damaging to the soul of the character and to finally see the Fool after such a long wait and him be this mangled, broken version of himself was not only deflating but... just wtf!! I dont want to read a broken Fitz AND a broken Fool, thats not how it works!!!!!!!

Overall, I am willing to chalk this up on the forgive and forget list. This is the first time I have ever in 13 books had a properly negative reaction to anything Hobb has done, and on a sheer mathematical level, that is astounding. She has not written 13 masterpiece books for me to dismiss that on the first slip up... I just think it feels especially brutal as its come right at the end, when were supposed to be in peak territory and everything is truly mastered. Listen, we have 2 books left with over 1200 pages, anything can happen and im hoping this is just a bump in the road and were back to usual form! There is plenty left to get excited about, and if there is one example of ultimately gripping storytelling, its that I have no idea whats going to happen next!  

Sometimes I think of songs that have movie end credits vibes or tv show intro vibes. Y'know, as a way to emotionally cope.

And yeah I'm aware of the song literally written about Fitz by Within Temptation (Hand of Sorrow if you wanna check it out)

But I've found myself more drawn to upbeat songs that have this kind of hype factor or resolution kind of feel, as a kind of fun contrast to the bittersweet feeling Robin's endings often leave us with lol

Here are some I associate with ROTE:

Assassin's Apprentice - Run by Delta Rae (to me this is peak fantasy vibes)

Royal Assassin - Brother by Matt Corby (surely needs no explanation)

Assassin's Quest - I'd Go With You Anywhere by Birds of Tokyo

Ship of Magic - Black Fingernails, Red Wine by Eskimo Joe (more of an intro vibe to me but yeah)

Fool's Errand - Who Are You, Really? by Mikky Ekko

That last one is really hitting for me right now. But what are some others?

I'm listening to the part, where Etta learns to read. I always listen to audiobooks, when i'm cooking and now my fried eggs are getting salted by my tears. I feel like these moments always come out of nowhere. God damn it. And Winthrows description of his romantic feelings for Etta. oh my god, why must you do this to me Hobb with your damn good prose.

……………………………………………………… What the fuck. :

I’ve suddenly garnered an overwhelming feeling that all of this effort at Withywoods, all of this desperate work to perfect his relationship with Bee and help everyone means Fitz is going to die in these last 100 pages. Or, at the very least, if Withywoods doesn’t end being burned to the ground, I will be shocked.

“Remind my sister that our father is a very brave man when you see her. Tell her I am learning to be brave, too.” Awesome stuff.

A being down an alleyway that Bee can’t see from producing so much light ? Fool, is that you? An a blind beggar she’s terrified of? This is trippy shit.

I deeply dislike Shun.

The Fool is the old man? Fitz has stabbed him? If the Fool dies here and now I’ll legit be so viscerally angry I will actually implode.

What the fuck is going on genuinely.

This can’t be it. Genuinely. This cannot be how The Fool dies. Usually if there’s a bait and switch in these books I can semi see them coming, but this is so insane on a genuinely shocking level that I am stunned.

If you gave me a thousand million guesses as to what happens in these last hundred pages or even what happens when we immediately see the Fool again, I would not have guess what’s unfolding.

I am feeling so many emotions right now. I’m frightened and in agony more than anything. Please don’t let The Fool die like this. I’m furious, if this truly is the way he goes. I’m also so confused. Why is he an old man? Why was he begging? Why has he been tortured? What is Hobb gaining from having this play out?

Genuinely, I think Riddle submitting to going through the Skill pillars and not even being mad that he just probably had a slice of his soul cut short has put him into top 10 characters of ROTE territory for me. The guy is and has always been, a GOAT.

So I was … mostly right. Servants of the Whites, hunting The Fool. Doing unspeakable things to him and his brethren. Horrendous.

The Fool isn’t a full White… leaving the door open for Bee?

Fool asks Fitz to assassinate the Servants. Hmm.

Wolf Father the spirit of Nighteyes (obvious but really cool).

And of course, the Servants are here… with a woman as a leader. Plump and ordinary looking.. interesting.

Fog man!?!?? WHO IS THE LIGHT MAN NOW FOG MAN FROM THE VILLAGE WITH THE SERVANTS?

FitzVigilant dead. wtf was the point of him!

THEY CAUGHT BEE. OH FUCK.

Holy shit, the fog man and Bee are … brothers? WHAT?

Also, called it! Bee is unexpected son.. (obvs).

Book complete. I mean… I don’t even know what to think. I absolutely love some parts, and I … don’t love some parts. Hobb’s most controversial book BY FAR. My number one aggravation is how aggressively the Fool has been mutilated… that has deeply upset me and ultimately felt weirdly delivered with him being a random beggar. It felt classless for a character I adore.

Outside of that here is a list of quick fire thoughts: Bee is amazing. Riddle is amazing. What was the point of Shun or FitzVigilant. Introducing another 1st person POV was insanely bold. We dithered in Withywoods for way too long. Revel was great. I hate everything that happened to the Fool. I love everything dream related and portentous that happened. I have no idea what happens next.

Will have this book finished tomorrow night! Shorter Bee chapters help:

I don’t really have a lot to say about what’s going on currently as a lot of it is kinda… the same? Fitz being a shit dad and Bee being a misfit! This isn’t a positive or negative, just a remark.

I can see that FitzVigilant and Bee seem to be set up as the next generations Fitz and Fool and ultimately whilst Hobb is selling their joining as quite portentous… I don’t know. For some reason I’m struggling to buy it?

I know I’ve said this before, but god Riddle is such a cool dude. Something about being reliable, dependable and honestly good in a world such as ROTE’s really hits.

I am ultimately enjoying this book but god I think it has suffered from being entirely based in Withywoods. I can see why, as clearly Hobb’s number 1 priority in this book is to bring the readers emotional attachment to Bee up to scratch, but I just think it’s dithered a LOT. Like I said, still enjoying, but a dormant Fitz is a … placid one maybe?

I will also say wild rampant speculation and personal expectation has probably set an unrealistically high bar for the final trilogy, whereas I know Hobb time and time again likes to reinvent herself.

I am still so taken aback by the route this final trilogy has took. How does all of Rainwilds, like bringing full dragons back to life, and having a Chalced at war with itself, and real Elderlings walking the earth, and a populated Kelsingra, how do all of those things correlate back to a plot that’s so far purely based in a countryside estate? What about Wintrow and Etta, and Prince Paragon? This feels so far away right now, like it will never happen, but I’m holding out hope we see them.

gun to my head, and this is probably entirely all wrong with 100 pages left, we end with The Fool arriving, probably in disarray after being chased by Whites (my only educated theory), and upending Fitz and Bee’s newfound life by revealing Bee is the unexpected son and we leave to go on our grand adventures in books 2 and 3.

I’m about 50% through Royal Assassin and I’m confused about something (please no spoilers past this point).

How does Verity not know Fitz has the Wit?

If Verity is in Fitz’s mind so often through the Skill, wouldn’t he be able to see/notice Fitz’s bond with Nighteyes and the fact that they hunt together? It feels like that should be obvious if he’s literally in Fitz’s head.

Am I missing something, or is this explained later?

I used to like her and still do but from fitz lens sone things stand out that

1. how she said that the bees are Supposed to be nettle’s servant which when you see through fitz and night eyes is pretty wrong

2. She doesn’t understand all that fitz has to do unlike her who is a normal person fitz is a royal bastard and a kings man so he can’t devote his life to her

3. also I think by the end of farseer she love burrich more than she ever loved fitz

4. Also she should understand fitz has to keep some of his secrets ( though he wasn’t hated in buckeep like he was in tradeford in assassin’s quest

5. I don’t think she understood how much the six duchies ment to fitz or tried to understand him

also ya I may be biased as I was taken aback

(what really happened before fitz got into verity DID THEY JUST HUG OR SOMETHING MORE IDK)

At the near end of the trilogy, my God Fitz? Can you not tell that they are asking questions about Molly? Fitz you frustrate the heck out of me!

Wow. I had to read it twice before I even realize what happened. Obviously the entire book was building up to it but it still was a blow.

It was beautifully written though, for such a short passage. I thought it was incredibly poignant how alive Nighteyes felt in his final shared moment with Fitz, ironically enough. Right until the end, he was so full of spirit.