Reviews with content warning for Slavery - Ship of Magic

I really wanted to love this, and I'm so glad I did. I was particularly excited to experience Hobb's writing in third person, and it was wonderful. Her prose remains top quality and very immersive.

This is overall just fantastic nautical fantasy with exceptional character writing, as well as complex and entertaining family dynamics. I enjoyed almost every POV for one reason or another. Hobb writes characters that you can root for here, and some that you vehemently despise. I cannot stand Kyle and Torg. Malta really annoyed me even though I understand she's still a kid, I just hope she learns and develops as a character. And I was always rooting for Brashen, Althea, and I really came to sympathize and feel attached to Wintrow. He deserves better, but unfortunately his father is beyond awful.

The additional worldbuilding for the Realm of the Elderlings with the liveships was also very interesting and unique. The idea of a sentient ship bonded through familial blood is amazing, especially because two ships have their own POV's and we get some insight into their perspectives. I'm very curious to learn more about the Rain Wild Traders as well. The relationships they have with the Bingtown traders is interesting, and I hope the sequels explore some of the actual Rain Wild territory. And I have a suspicion about the serpents, but I still don't really know what's going on with them. They're cool though.

Even though the plot was pretty non-existent for most of the book—per usual with Hobb so far—this was surprisingly just addicting to read. The blurb on the cover says "as addictive as morphine," and that's a pretty apt metaphor for my experience. Nautical fantasy just works so well for the visual movie I have running in my brain when reading, and it seems to scratch an itch. Paired with fantastic writing and captivating character dynamics, this is an amazing read. I could see myself bumping it to 5 stars depending on how the trilogy pans out.

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allcapspyrex's review against another edition

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adventurous slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

Definitely a strong follow up from the farseer trilogy which I loved. Hobb has done a great job of expanding the world she started in her first trilogy, showing there is a lot of story left to tell. The book makes great use of multi-pov storytelling to really make the reader invested in the characters, and there aren't any I didn't have strong feelings for as their individual stories unfolded and contributed to the overall plot. It's definitely very slow paced, which is the only thing stopping it being a full 5 stars for me, but absolutely worth your time and effort to read, and I'm looking forward to the next two in the series.

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backflippinwafflepancakes's review against another edition

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adventurous dark medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

2.0

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hilwithonel's review against another edition

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adventurous medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

5.0

Look, I grew up on the farseer books. My favorite of all time.

And then I read this.

Robin Hobb's writing is.... perfect????????!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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