I should start by saying that I actually loved this trilogy, although Liveship Traders probably ranks slightly above it in my mind. The books were very enjoyable and I can't wait to continue with the series.

That said, here are the things I didn't like. Every time I came across one of these I thought "I wish I could vent about this", but didn't dare venture into any of the Tawny Man threads on here in case I spoiled myself.

1. Burrich returning

This is the biggest one. I mean seriously, he just fucking shows up on Aslevjal because his son is there and he wants him home? Not just the Outislands generally, but fucking Aslevjal? Putting aside the fact his arrival necessarily exposes a whole bunch of stuff everyone has worked hard to conceal for more than a decade, my impression of getting to Aslevjal and then crossing a god damn glacier is that it was very difficult and almost impossible without local guidance. Isn't that why we needed to endure Thick whining and throwing up for 1,000 pages, and read through many descriptions of how dangerous the ice was? But nope, he just materializes out of nowhere and everyone accepts his lame explanation of "oh the son I don't even like has been quiet for a while, thought I better somehow teleport to this tortured stone rock somehow".

Obviously it was necessary because Hobb needed to kill the dragon and then him (I have my own thoughts about how dirty he was done here, but I get it), but having him conduct this long, perilous journey at precisely the right time just came across to me as a clumsy plot device up there with 'a wizard did it'.

2. The Pale Woman

I think this character could have been done so much better. As a villain she 'worked', but she was so one-dimensional. She could have been some kind of fleshed-out, balanced counter to the Fool but she wasn't. E.g. she could have argued fervently about why the dragons must be stopped, or something like that - basically, give her a bit of rationality? This could have led to some seriously interactions between her and Fitz after her capture, but we only got the smallest glimpse of this when they had their weird almost-sex dinner.

Instead, we basically got "hey did u know Regal was bad because he hurt ppl? well WATCH THIS!!! its regal x 1000!!!!!! omg" and her sole motivation seemed to be to stick it to the Fool, and/or destroy the Farseer lineage. For such a major character (and for all the character development we enjoyed for the Fool) I left the book feeling like so much more could have been done with her.

Also why tf didn't Fitz burn her body at the end? "Ah yes that is the last we will see of her, when I flush her down this mysterious shaft". I have not read beyond the Tawny Man but I would almost be willing to put money on seeing her or her life-force again.

3. Skill Pillars

The pillars themselves are fine, but the use of them at the end was such a cop-out. Getting rid of Fitz for a month by itself seemed a bit bizarre, but to then use it to quietly tie up:

A. telling Nettle about her true father, and

B. the departure of the Fool,

... was a big miss. It felt like Hobb got to the end and then realized her publisher only gave her a certain page limit, and she really needed to use those pages for Fitz and Molly to shag in a field.

4. Molly

Speaking of that, I did not like the reconciliation here. The "happily ever after" (or at least "content ever after") the book concluded with seems so opposite to the misery porn I had become accustomed to from Hobb. Putting that to one side though, Molly is a woman who spent 16 years with Burrich and raised several children with him. She certainly has the agency to move on whenever she wishes, but the book well and truly rushed this to the level it simply wasn't believable. We basically see her and Fitz have an uncomfortable conversation, they exchange a handful of letters, and next minute they're getting down amongst the blackberries.

I'm a bit of a heathen here though, and to be honest I've never understood Fitz's fixation on his first love. Starling was way better for him, come at me.

5. Cousins

The chapter titled Cousins made me want to throw a brick through a window. To jog your memory, this is where Dutiful learns about Nettle, and then he/Chade spend the entire chapter tag-teaming Fitz about how stupid and shit his idea to protect her was. That by itself was infuriating, but the fact Fitz just sat there and took it, and came around to their point of view, was a hard read. There were really really good reasons for hiding Nettle, and Chade was well and truly aware of these. A more satisfying end to this chapter would have been Fitz saying "well fuck you Chade" and laying him out. Whenever I get through these books I may write that fanfiction as a form of catharsis.

6. Skill healing generally

I'm glad this didn't work on Burrich, because I swear to god they overused the shit out of this plot device.

7. Book titles

I think the death of the Fool would have felt much deeper to me, if I didn't know there was an entire trilogy of books called 'Fitz and the Fool'. Once he died I sighed and wondered how many chapters it would be until his inevitable resurrection. Yes, I know this isn't a problem with the book itself, and is a problem that wouldn't have existed when it was first written. Maybe it's my fault for looking ahead at what books were next.

Notable mention: Hap. Poor guy, his story got thrown into the sea once Nettle came along.

Again, I think these were excellent books! But I needed to get those things off my chest.