Ha, I came into this thread to say exactly this! (Except that I think I actually finished it. But I couldn't actually tell you anything that happened, except that there is, like, Gonturan and colonialism.)

lightgetsin, mind, Hero and the Crown was written in the 80's, so rationally I'm sure it's got its fair share of problems (it was one of my beloved childhood books so I can't look at it rationally), and it's certainly true McKinley basically just sucks at plot formation in general, but it is much more interesting than Blue Sword.