Blood of Assassins

By: RJ Barker

Narrated by: Joe Jameson

Length: 15 hrs and 9 mins

Publisher's summary

The epic sequel to RJ Barker's fantasy debut Age of Assassins, set in a world ravaged by magic, featuring a cast of assassins, knights, and ambitious noblemen.

In a desperate bid to escape the bounty on his head, assassin Girton Club-Foot has returned to Maniyadoc, but the kingdom he knew no longer exists.

Three kings battle for supremacy in a land ravaged by war-and one of them is his old friend Rufra. With threats inside and outside the war encampment, Girton races to find the traitor behind an assassination plot. But his magic can no longer be contained and Girton may not be able to save even himself.

It's assassin versus assassin for the life of a king.

©2018 RJ Barker (P)2018 Hachette Audio

enjoyable

Liked the story. Sections were a bit slow but overall well done. Pick this up for a fun weekend listen.

Five years later...

The story of Girton continues. He has been fighting around the world with his master for five years, and now has some back to see his friend, King Rufra, only to be swept back into the political maneuverings of the kingdom.

This character is interesting because he's flawed, and is being torn in several directions by magic and duty. He makes mistakes. He gives in to the tug of power. But his heart is (mostly) in the right place.

Joe Jameson does an excellent narration of the audiobook. Plenty of violence, no sex, no foul language.

Now on to the third book. "One my master, two my master..."

Pleasant and Enjoyable.

I picked this up after listening to the first book.

The devolving characters and their relationships are powerfully written.

Joe Jameson’s performance is great as always.

slow but worth it

most of the book was kind of slow but I still loved it when it picked up despite it being slow it still managed to be good

Still great

Not quite as enjoyable as the first due to Girton being annoying at times but still amazing and quite addicting

Girton becomes less interesting

With Merela incapacitated due to a poisoning and unable to provide him council, Girton becomes much more distrustful of those around him and almost completely loses his prior ability to offer any friendly and comical rejoinders to even the least criticisms or disagreements. He is almost always sullen and, at times, finds himself musing on some of the darker sides of his magical abilities.

Throughout this book's story arc Girton reasoning and actions are that of a man-child and his untethering from Merela's council due to her comatose state causes him to make decisions based on his feelings rather than on deliberated reasoned judgement. Almost all of these makes matters worse for him and those around him. While this makes him a less sympathetic character, it seems that RJ Barker intentionally wanted to convey that twisting within him. In a very real way, he illustrated how young adults forced to shoulder unbearable responsibilities will more often than not make tragic mistakes by grasping for convenient solutions.

I was a bit disappointed that while the whole theme of the book is centered on assassins and, in particularly, Girton and Merela skills, neither of them exercised much stealthy blood work most commonly attributed to that skill.

Joe Jameson continued to provide a stellar narration performance.

Onto book 3.

Enjoyable Military Mystery

The storytelling is excellent, and the character development is realistic and honest.

Narration is the star of the book.

The MC was infuriating!

I loved the the MC in the first book of the series but now he is simply intolerable. How can you go 5 years into the future but the MC regressed to the mindset of a 9 year old child? I can understand the author wants to make his character fallible but he overdone it and made him a fool. No respect.

Damn whiny main character

Couldn’t finish it. The main is nothing but a whiny petulant idiot who throws tantrums and believes he is the only one who knows anything despite being proven wrong time and again. Just a beating

It's alright.. but not to my tastes..

The first book I found the main character frustrating and very lacking when it came to being an assassin.. the second book is more akin to a military campaign rather than a book about assassins.. is this a series about assassins actually doing their jobs or more like supposed assassins being detectives and only looking for people that have hidden motives all the time? I've come to the conclusion that this series has very little to do with assassins actually doing their jobs and more about well trained fighters doing detective work, fantasy politics and military campaigns.. the lack of assassins doing the work of assassination is enough for me to drop the series. The narrator does a great job, but the story is just not for me, these characters are not assassins.