Talk:Farseer trilogy/GA1

GA Review

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Reviewer: David Fuchs (talk · contribs) 19:17, 24 January 2022 (UTC)

{{in progress}} Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs ^talk 19:17, 24 January 2022 (UTC)

Thanks for taking this on. Olivaw-Daneel (talk) 19:55, 24 January 2022 (UTC)

• General:
  • The reception section seems rather thin for the content (critical reception of three novels.) I don't think for GA it needs to be exhaustive, but there's basically five critics talking about the books and it rapidly shifts to talking about the wider Realm of the Elderlings series. Doing a quick search just for Assassin's Apprentice found contemporary reviews by the Library Journal, Fantasy & Science Fiction, Publishers Weekly, Booklist, as well as modern reviews.
    • Expanded.
  • The themes section gives me pause, just because many of the subsections are wholly or almost-entirely single (or, with the queer themes, two) academics' views. I don't think there's anything wrong with going with these opinions or analysis, but they need to be properly weighted, and if you can only find one or two people to talk about this stuff, it implies it's not something that deserves as much elaboration.
    • Condensed. (Focused on overlap in views. Larsson cites Melville and agrees with him; similar occurrence with the other two scholars.)
• Prose:
  • It seems weird the plot summary for the first book starts with background info and in the sentence after says The first book, Assassin's Apprentice, begins when a six-year-old Fitz is brought to the kingdom.—It implies the detail before wasn't from the book, and you don't introduce either of the following books explicitly like this.
    • Changed to closely follow the narration. (The narrator is writing a memoir, and it starts at the age of 6).
  • Nosy later dies at the end of the first book after foiling an attempt by Regal to assassinate Fitz, who also thwarts his attempts to kill his older brother, Prince Verity, and his wife Kettricken.—Not really clear who is doing the thwarting in the second part of this... maybe Fitz, maybe Nosy? It's a tough bit to get through so I would clarify and break up into multiple sentences.
  • Nighteyes' partnership with Fitz occurs in Royal Assassin and develops at the same time as his friendship with the Fool, the court jester, and his romantic relationship with Molly, a young maid. Another very long sentence with unclear use of commas (is the fool the court jester, or is the jester another character?)
    • Both sentences broken up.
  • The group find Verity in a quarry of Skill stone, surrounded by stone dragons, where he attempts to carve a dragon himself. They assist him, but discover, however, that awakening a dragon requires Verity to sacrifice his memories and all that makes him human. They thwart Regal's attempts to stop their efforts, awaken the stone dragons and fly to the Six Duchies. So... the stone enables them to create dragons, or the dragons already existed? Not entirely sure how the magic is working here. Also, if the creation of the dragon causes Verity to sacrifice his memories, it should be made clear. Right now it just suggests that's a possibility but doesn't tell us whether or not he actually did it.
    • Added more details. Carving and awakening a stone dragon requires Verity to Skill his memories into the stone.
  • The trilogy ends on a bittersweet note for Fitz, who defeats Regal, the raiders and the Forged with the aid of the stone dragons, but loses his beloved Molly and their child to the care of Burrich. He masks his identity and stays an outcast, living with Nighteyes at the edge of society.—think since it's been a while since Molly got brought up we need a little more to explain why he loses his love and child. (Earlier it sounds like they have conflicts over his political duties, but in the end he's an outcast instead, so what broke them up? If it's that he was still believed guilty for the made-up charges, that should be made clearer.)
    • Added more about Molly to the beginning of Assassin's Quest – she believes that Fitz is dead. (At the end, Fitz thinks that it's too late to get back together.) Hope that context makes it clearer.
  • I don't think there's a solid fair-use justification for the excerpt in the quote box in "Themes".
  • The political systems in the Farseer trilogy have been described by scholar Deszcz-Tryhubczak—why is she getting another explainer when she was introduced as a scholar earlier already?
    • Both removed.
• Media:
• References:
  • References used look reliable and appropriate.
  • Spot-checked statements attributed to current refs 1, 4, 5, 7, 9, 11, 12, 16, 23, 29, 35, 40, 41, and 44.
    • Refs 4 and 5 are used to cite the end of this statement: Her earlier writing appeared as Megan Lindholm, and was critically well-received,[2] including Hugo and Nebula Award nominations for her short fiction,[3] but did not do as well in terms of sales, motivating a change in byline. Looking at the sources, I think this overemphasizes the sales element for the name change, when in Blaschke 2005 she gives three different reasons for the pen name change, with the sales only one of them (and you mention the androgynous pen name choice elsewhere in the article already.)
      • Re-phrased; also removed androgynous from the lead.
    • The Tor ref 44 doesn't seem to adequately cite all the content in the "Sequels" section, particularly precise numbers of novels, their divisions, and exact chronologies.
      • Added more refs.

--Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs ^talk 15:52, 29 January 2022 (UTC)

Thanks, appreciate the feedback on cutting down themes/expanding reception. I'll work through this in the next couple days. Olivaw-Daneel (talk) 01:26, 30 January 2022 (UTC)

@David Fuchs: I think I've addressed all your comments. Olivaw-Daneel (talk) 11:56, 3 February 2022 (UTC)

Looks much improved. I will take one more look-over and if I don't have any additional concerns, will pass. Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs ^talk 17:04, 4 February 2022 (UTC)