If you can read a physical copy the narrator for this specific book does it an incredible disservice

Heeee’s ba-a-a-ack!

And with quite the resounding tale! R.A. Salvatore regains his powerful writing form with this third installment of The Sellswords, staring the conniving drow Jarlaxle and the human assassin Artemis Entreri. Fans of the characters and the series rejoice, for we can all stop wondering ‘What About Bob?’

With the exception of Part III’s slightly unbalanced conclusion and the unnecessary inclusion of Drizzt’s whining journal entries, this book qualifies as one of Salvatore’s better efforts. After skipping character study in the entire Book II of The Sellswords series, Salvatore utilizes it extensively here, exploring not only the personal life, motivation and growth of our two star characters but also surprising us with the examination of a third. Almost everything Book II lacked is present in Book III. Throw in Salvatore’s (standard) superb fight scenes, action sequences and just plain fun characters and we have a wonderfully refreshing fantasy.

Salvatore announces his return at the get-go with a striking beginning placing us straight within Entreri’s soul. He immediately follows this with a signature action scene staring one of his most obnoxious characters, Athrogate. Both of these scenes serve notice upon the reader: Salvatore is writing with a vengeance.

Despite the complaints voiced in Amazon reviews, this book far surpasses the quality of the last. There is no let down in action, no lacking of exciting description. There are fiercer internal struggles and harder-edged external battles. There are some more adult-aimed concepts than is normal in this series but nothing — nothing — along the lines of GRRM or the complexities of character found in Erikson’s works. This story is a well-done analysis of Entreri with terrific delving into his past and psyche. It even provides good insight into Jaraxle and the changes his own manipulations and games have effected upon him. But, while Athrogate has grown on me to the point where I now like him, if all he’s become by story end is Jaraxle’s latest foil and Entreri’s stand-in I will be quite disappointed.

There are few negatives to this work, but they are noteworthy. All three sections of Drizzt’s ‘thoughts’ were intrusions that totally pulled me from the tale, especially his four page rant to begin Part II (In fact, this actually came across as Salvatore’s own none-too-disguised commentary on governmental leadership). Many readers have tired of hearing Drizzt’s whine in his own books so why they are included in books he’s not even present in is beyond me.

Then there is the abrupt shift in setting, character, even perspective that begins Part III. It takes several scenes for Salvatore’s writing to even out before it feels like we have achieved the same narrative flow we had prior to the break. Part of this is due to an abominably edited section roughly 50 pages long about two-thirds of the way into the book and leading right into this section. There are missing words — even one whole sentence — misused words and almost verbatim lines throughout this section. Fortunately the story and writing recovers from both of these self-inflicted harms and ends strongly, even setting up the continuing adventures of all three characters — and a host of secondary characters and plots with potential stories of their own.

Despite this slightly off-kilter ending, I enjoyed this book. I especially relished moving deeper into the minds and souls of two great fantasy characters that I’ve fondly traveled many trails with. This book also boasts, in my opinion, one of the best and most fitting covers ever to adorn a fantasy novel. Would I recommend Road of the Patriarch by R.A. Salvatore to my friends? Bob has redeemed himself in my eyes — YES!

Pierde fuerza con respecto al libro anterior, sin aclarar cómo Entreri aparece en libros posteriores...

Great wrap-up for Artemis Entreri arc /series. With Dragons and a fiery dwarf some elves and half-elfs being introduced. As well as half-orcs.

An excellent addition to the Sellswords series. We get a well thought out introspection into Artemis Entreri, and plenty of action.

Salvatore did a great job making Jarlaxle and Entreri into people, with their own distinct motives, and lives. He gives us a great odd-couple pairing that drives the narrative to an fun conclusion.

Argh. The weakest in the trilogy. There are some really good scenes throughout the book, but there is too much happening at once... and in the same time, nothing happens. There's a lot of new characters and subplots, but story simply goes nowhere (and as a result, there is no focus and the book becomes very hard to read). The whole Spysong stroyline started interesting, but quickly became tedious and completely pointless. I liked the ending, but this is definitely a very weak conclusion to a trilogy.

New

R.A. Salvatore is one of my guilty-pleasure authors. He writes sword-and-sorcery pulp fantasy, and who's not in the mood for that sometimes?

What I'm not in the mood for is a poorly-plotted, meandering end to a misbegotten trilogy. The problems I have with the Sellswords trilogy are:

1) Artemis Entreri developing a conscience. Redemption arcs are fine; I like them, love them even. But they have to be believable. His "love story" from books 2 and 3 feels completely tacked-on, and his love interest is an utterly unbelievable character.

2) Jarlaxle. Jarlaxle, Jarlaxle, Jarlaxle. Obviously, Salvatore loves this character. I can't stand him. Personally, he's obnoxious. Plotwise, the ability to pull the ideal magical item out to deal with ANY situation robs the series of whatever tension or drama it had. I was kind of hoping he'd die somehow, while knowing in my heart an author's pet like him would never buy it.

I like the original Drizzt stories, though the series goes on far too long and becomes far too repetitive. I like the Cleric Quintet as well. But at this point? I think I'm done with future Salvatore books.

Last book in the Sellsword trilogy which continues our adventures with Jarlaxle and Artemis.

This seemed more like three novella's connection by main characters than it did a fully formed novel and it went from having two star sections up to five star sections.

It had great characters (it is Salvatore after all), magic, orcs, dragons.
It had some action but nowhere near what usually accompanies a Salvatore novel.
It kept me turning the pages but honestly the first 200 pages were slow.

But it was good, not great but good.

When I picked this book up I was looking for some good vs. evil, some action and some great characters (I had read quite a few YA books in a row and needed something meatier but not quite Thoreau) and Bob delivered.

I enjoyed this and think you probably would as well.

An extremely good conclusion to the Sellswords trilogy. Two middle-aged men (a drow mercenary and a human assassin) make each other both considerably worse and considerably better at the same time.

The middle portion, all the King Gareth stuff, really dragged, but the rest of the book didn't, and it came back to the emotional core for part 3 and did so with a vengeance. Heavy stuff (it deals with CSA, clerical abuses of the poor, and so on) but well-handled. I genuinely love the emotional complexity; there aren't happy endings here, and even when things changed 'for the best' that doesn't always matter. (That said I'm sure glad knowing this isn't the END of the series, and knowing things will eventually get better for them both from here).

Jarlaxle and Entreri find themselves having to answer for their actions from events in Promise of the Witch-King. Later Jarlaxle, Entreri and Athrogate go to the city of Memnon, where Entreri was born. This is the last book of the trilogy. I loved all three books. This book helped define these characters. I read that the sellswords trilogy was a stand alone, because it did no have Drizzt and his companions. So I read them almost last, right after the Homecoming series, books 31-33. I wishes I had read the sellswords in order, these would have been books 14-16 in the legend of Drizzt series. These books help define characters and introduce characters that are in later books. I really enjoyed this series.

As always,a very good read.Still enjoying Salvatore books.