City of Dragons by Robin Hobb

 The Farseer Trilogy

Assassin's Apprentice

Royal Assassin

Assassin's Quest

The Liveship Traders Trilogy

The Tawny Many Trilogy

Fool's Errand

Golden Fool

Fool's Fate

The Rain Wilds Chronicles

Dragon Keeper

Dragon Haven

As we move along through the Realm of the Elderlings saga, I have to say that I continue to be impressed with Hobb. I wasn't exactly in love with Dragon Haven, but this book was so exciting.  I just kept racing from chapter to chapter and just thought it was quite exciting. There's a bunch of different plotlines coming together and we see some characters from Liveship Traders.  This is definitely the best of the Rain Wilds Chronicles.

Plots:

1) Leftrin, the captain of Tarman, returns to civilization to resupply and get paid.  The Council is being a bit petty and not paying him.

2) The Duke of Chalced wants dragon parts to cure his illness.  There are assassins and spies.  

3) The Elderlings from The Liveship Traders, Malta, Reyn, and Selden come back! Selden is part of plot #2, and Malta is pregnant the baby is born, but only Tarman can help. The baby needs dragons!

4) The dragons are still separated from the legendary city of Kelsingra by a river.  But then Sintara can fly and she opens up secrets to the city.  The Keepers are cold, hungry, and exhausted, but if they could just get the rest of the dragons over to the city, things might change.

5) This bird keeper thing.  Because of plot #2, there's a dirty bird keeper and things are getting nasty. It's also making it hard to communicate because birds are expensive and in rare supply.

A lot of reviews say that this book is a leisurely journey to nowhere, but I disagree. I'm finally starting to see how some of the threads from the previous trilogies are coming together and I'm super pumped for the last installment of this quartet. And then! THEN! The last trilogy. I can't tell if I'm sad or excited about the end of this literary journey.

Be ready for Blood of Dragons soon. It's on the shelf at my local library and as soon as they pull it for me*, I'm going to go get it ASAP.

*The Covid numbers in Wisconsin are terrifying and our local library has gone back to curbside pickup. That means I have to drive the three blocks to my library to pick up books.  I like that they collect the books for me, but I feel dumb driving just a few blocks, so I have taken to only going to the library when I'm out for other things. I will make an exception to this self-imposed rule for another dragon book.