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I'm well into the third Farseer book, and they are hitting the spot. I'm still seeing echoes of a lot of Wheel of Time's better qualities, but Hobb's characters act their ages and even when they are obsessed with the opposite sex, it's a bit more nuanced. The magic system is very, shall we say, narratively convenient in getting around the limitations of a first person telling. One could make the case that the POV is first person limited omniscient. I'm not usually a fan of prophecy as a plot device, but Hobb is clever with it and doesn't lean on it too heavily. The characters are believably admirable, believably villainous, and believably confused, according to their natures and circumstances. Here and there the romance elements are a bit much for my tastes, but they only dominate the story for short stretches.
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