Ship of Magic

With news that one of my favorite authors, Robin Hobb, is preparing to return to the Realm of the Elderlings in an upcoming novel (or two)[1], I decided to pull Ship of Magic
off the shelf for a reread.  Ship of Magic is the first volume of The Liveship Traders trilogy and takes place a few years after the Farseer Trilogy.[2]  It has been a number of years since I read Ship of Magic and am always cautious when it comes time to reread a book after a long interval.  Will I still find the story engaging?  Will the characters' development seem natural in light of the information I know from later in the story?  Will books that I loved as a kid or young adult still live up to my presumably more mature scrutiny?

 

In the case of Ship of Magic, the answers are all a resounding yes.  The Liveship Traders tackle compelling  issues of gender equality, imperialism, and slavery in the context of the struggles of individuals trying to leave their personal marks in the world, or at least survive it.  The story opens with introductions of a wide cast of characters (a pirate with big ambitions, a young woman with the need to prove herself, and her mother trying to cope with the loss of her husband – to name but a few) and is a wide departure from the first-person narrative of the Farseer Trilogy. The narrative immediate flavors the story with a sense of foreboding, a pregnant pause of anticipation for the drama that is about to be inflicted on the cast.  Financial problems face the family of the main characters, political disagreements strain relations with the imperial capital, and strange, non-human creatures dot the landscape with their incomprehensible motivations.  While telling the particular stories of the varied protagonists, the author fills in pieces of the history of the Realm of the Elderlings and lays the foundations for stories 4 and 5 books away.

The soft hand with which Robin Hobb builds the history and rules of her universe is especially prevalent in the Ship of Magic.  This story introduces us to concepts not present in the Farseer Trilogy, but which fit that effort’s world building in a complimentary manner in a seamless transition from the cold and barbaric north lands to the more “civilized” and temperate south.  Because of this subtle approach, new readers are not left wondering what was missed by picking up this book first while devoted fans can catch subtle foreshadowing or explanations of past events.  By re-reading this volume, the skill of this construction is even more pronounced.  Pick it up today and you won’t be disappointed.

It may be hard for me to wait six months to a year for the next novel. Luckily, Robin Hobb has a short story set in the Realm of the Elderlings in the recently released A Fantasy Medley and there is always the “Homecoming” in the anthology Legends II.

Ship of Magic? 4 M’s out of 5
Re-reading Ship of Magic?  4.5 M’s out of 5

 

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[1] Dragon Keeper is scheduled to be released  in the United Kingdom in the summer of 2009 and in the United States in the winter of 2010.  Robin Hobb reports that the manuscript came in at double the expected length and that the book may be released as two volumes. 

[2] The Liveship Traders trilogy was itself followed by The Tawny Man trilogy to complete a trilogy of trilogies set in the Realm of the Elderlings.  In contrast, The Soldier Son trilogy, discussed earlier on this blog, is not set in the Realm of the Elderlings.