The Golden Fool

Executive Summary: I really enjoyed this book, and found myself staying up till 2 in the morning and rudely reading while visiting with family on Christmas Eve just to finish it.

Full Review
There isn't a lot for me to really say about this book without getting into spoilers. Robin Hobb seems to find a way make you really care about her characters and suck you into the story even when it's just day to day living. Of course Fitz's days are a tad bit more interesting than your average person.

It also re-enforces my belief that you're really missing out by skipping Liveship Traders and moving right to Tawny Man from Farseer. I don't see how you can really understand the depth of some of the events of this book a lot that happens in this book without the full back-story from the previous trilogy.

In this book Fitz learns more about the Fool, and it changes their relationship. I however don't feel like I learned anything that I didn't already suspect. It simply confirmed those suspicions while leaving me questions I hope will finally be answered in the last book.

This book does suffer a bit from middle book syndrome. A lot of it really sets up the final book in the trilogy. That doesn't mean I was bored along the way, simply that the ending didn't come to any satisfying conclusion.

Really it just leaves me hoping for a lot of things to be resolved in the final book. When I was done I wanted to jump right into the final book, but didn't have time due to the holidays.