cimorene

I read all of Robin Hobb's Dragon Keeper in a couple of days. I enjoyed it a lot and found it very readable and interesting, although it still has too many POV characters for my taste. In fact, I barely read any of McKillip's The Riddle-Master of Hed in the middle of it.

But then I got to the end unexpectedly and realized it wasn't just ending on a cliffhanger, or a TOTAL cliffhanger (although not as total as Zelazny's literal cliffhanger): it was ending halfway through all the major plot threads of what felt, to the genre-literate reader me as I went along, like the plot of the book. Like she just wrote... about half a book and published it as a book?! So I got the second book right away, but when I opened it and it didn't start with the speed and plot involvement of the end of Dragon Keeper, my annoyance overcame my curiosity during the "previously, on this unfinished trilogy" infodump stuff, and I set it aside again. This world admittedly got extra points for the dragons being central to it from me, and that still holds true even though they are not really very close to my favorite sorts of dragons. The worldbuilding is still cool. Another big part of the credit comes from the multiple female protagonists though. I was getting sick of male narrators. (I also feel a little silly for having avoided trying Robin Hobb for such a long time? I guess she was another victim of my sense that things that are too popular can't be really good. But on the other hand, maybe writing half books is annoying enough to justify that avoidance after all, not sure yet.)

The Riddle-Master of Hed continues interesting, and it's only got the one narrator, which is great, but it doesn't really have any important female characters with a lot of page time. I mean, it's not sexist; there are powerful and well-rounded women and they have full personalities and motivations and are different from each other. Just. They're sort of encountered along the way, so far. Also, the central force in this book is the title character being torn between his obvious destiny and his desire for the simple beautiful farming life on his little rural island farming paradise. Which is like, I feel your pain, but you start to look pretty stupid trying to "that's not my business tho" when an unknown malevolent force keeps sending magic assassins after you? Like you clearly aren't getting much of a choice here. He even argues with multiple people who point out that just going back to his farm isn't going to help because the magical assassins will just follow him and he's like "But then I can die a peaceful yet over-educated farmer who just happens to have omens and portents and a magical mystical ancient harp...", and he only finally gives in to the idea of engaging with reality when he realizes he'll have to permanently break up with his potential betrothed if he just waits for death. Man, seriously?

I like the style though. And I don't have any grudges against this book, philosophically speaking, that would prevent me continuing the trilogy with Heir of Sea and Fire! I might need to find another female-led fantasy book to read before I try Dragon Haven, though.