King of Thorns

This book has a recommendation from Conn Iggulden on its cover that says: “Excellent - on par with George R. R. Martin.”
NO, IT'S NOT!!! It has to be taken out of context or Iggulden is an idiot who never read any other fantasy. (Don't know the guy) This is relatively small story with one main character and while there are politics and violence, their presence is about the only thing the books have in common!

It's more like 3.5 but considering the improvement from the terrible Prince of Thorns it deserves 4 stars.

However, there were still things that irritated me. It feels like this whole trilogy should be just one 1000 pages long book and author or publisher decided that trilogy will make more money. For the vast majority of this book I wondered where will all of this lead.

There are two stories here. One on a wedding day 4 years after the events of Prince and one happening via flashbacks from those 4 years that fills the vast majority of the book. While reading the flashbacks I understood what was going on, but I didn't understand why should I care. It all comes together at the end but the ending is anticlimactic and I still don't see why I had to read 450 pages of almost pointless flashbacks when it could've been told on 100 pages.

I've got to say, though, that the writting really REAlly REALLY improved! Prince felt like a first draft of a young unskilled author but this time around everything was coherent and decently described.