Book Review: Ship of Magic by Robin Hobb
May. 5th, 2016 03:28 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
juushikaTitle: Ship of Magic (The Liveship Traders Book 1)
Author: Robin Hobb
Published: New York: Del Rey, 2004 (1999)
Rating: 4 of 5
Page Count: 800
Total Page Count: 186,520
Text Number: 548
Read Because: continuing the Realm of the Elderlings, ebook borrowed from the Multnomah County Library
Review: The Liveship Vivacia awakes to sentience while upheaval unsettles both the ship's owning family and the larger array of trade and pirate ports that stretch along the Cursed Shores. 800 pages is almost inexcusably long, especially given Hobb's repetitive wording and the fact that—though it lacks a cliffhanger, and while both characters and plot progress—this novel has no significant resolution. But there's something deeply immersive in Ship of Magic. The slow pacing helps, as does the large cast, well-lived word, and strong seafaring aesthetic; the plot's ethos is that all that can go wrong must go wrong (but things can always get worse) and central themes concern sexism and slavery—and while this sparks painful frustration-by-proxy it is also keenly sympathetic. I suspect I'm only so patient with this series because my love of the Farseer trilogy makes me trust Hobb to her long-form, slow stories—but I adored this, despite its obvious weaknesses, and look forward to the next book.
Yesterday I woke up early for no valid reason and also it was a million degrees out, so I spent more or less the entire day in bed, electronics turned off, reading Robin Hobb's Ship of Magic (Liveship Traders Trilogy Book 1)—and I'm still not done, because it's about 800 pages long. There's no honest excuse for that length, and tight editing could at least trim the word count if not content because dat redundant phrasing. And yet, the relaxed, sprawling approach (to world and plot, but also language) is so immersive—a different type of immersive than the intimate and narrow focus of the Farseer Trilogy.
But I had one specific issue midway through the book, which was with Malta's precocity. The book focuses heavily on sexism as cultural phenomenon, a social force that affects all individuals—and while I do mean heavily, Hobb leaving little room for understatement, this is a more or less welcome (if frequently frustrating to read) change from the Farseer Trilogy's limited female cast/worldview. But Malta's sexual curiosity is strangely handled, especially when seen from her grandmother Ronica's PoV:
At this point, Malta is, what, thirteen? Thirteen! She has not internalized the worst of predatory sexuality from adults, her behavior is not on par with predatory sexuality in men; she's thirteen. More logically, her precocity is the result of internalized sexism and heteronormativity. The book threatens women with husbands and makes their gendered roles a punishment, which is valid, but never considers that people internalize the standards they're judged by, and that a girl growing up in a world where women are only valuable as objects of sexual desire would want to make herself valuable, desired. Perhaps this is intentional, a generation illustration of a society growing increasingly sexist? Perhaps it is readdressed or resolved later. But what it feels like is one part a missed opportunity to further engage in feminist criticism and one part so gross oh my god.
Author: Robin Hobb
Published: New York: Del Rey, 2004 (1999)
Rating: 4 of 5
Page Count: 800
Total Page Count: 186,520
Text Number: 548
Read Because: continuing the Realm of the Elderlings, ebook borrowed from the Multnomah County Library
Review: The Liveship Vivacia awakes to sentience while upheaval unsettles both the ship's owning family and the larger array of trade and pirate ports that stretch along the Cursed Shores. 800 pages is almost inexcusably long, especially given Hobb's repetitive wording and the fact that—though it lacks a cliffhanger, and while both characters and plot progress—this novel has no significant resolution. But there's something deeply immersive in Ship of Magic. The slow pacing helps, as does the large cast, well-lived word, and strong seafaring aesthetic; the plot's ethos is that all that can go wrong must go wrong (but things can always get worse) and central themes concern sexism and slavery—and while this sparks painful frustration-by-proxy it is also keenly sympathetic. I suspect I'm only so patient with this series because my love of the Farseer trilogy makes me trust Hobb to her long-form, slow stories—but I adored this, despite its obvious weaknesses, and look forward to the next book.
Yesterday I woke up early for no valid reason and also it was a million degrees out, so I spent more or less the entire day in bed, electronics turned off, reading Robin Hobb's Ship of Magic (Liveship Traders Trilogy Book 1)—and I'm still not done, because it's about 800 pages long. There's no honest excuse for that length, and tight editing could at least trim the word count if not content because dat redundant phrasing. And yet, the relaxed, sprawling approach (to world and plot, but also language) is so immersive—a different type of immersive than the intimate and narrow focus of the Farseer Trilogy.
But I had one specific issue midway through the book, which was with Malta's precocity. The book focuses heavily on sexism as cultural phenomenon, a social force that affects all individuals—and while I do mean heavily, Hobb leaving little room for understatement, this is a more or less welcome (if frequently frustrating to read) change from the Farseer Trilogy's limited female cast/worldview. But Malta's sexual curiosity is strangely handled, especially when seen from her grandmother Ronica's PoV:
Keffria had worried that Malta was too naïve to be brought into Bingtown society as a young woman, fearing that men might take advantage of her. The opposite was more likely true. [...] Ronica was looking at her granddaughter with new eyes. What she saw there she found no more admirable in a woman than in a man. A little predator, she was. Ronica wondered it if were already too late to do anything about it. When had the pretty little girl metamorphosed into not a woman but a grasping, conquering female?
At this point, Malta is, what, thirteen? Thirteen! She has not internalized the worst of predatory sexuality from adults, her behavior is not on par with predatory sexuality in men; she's thirteen. More logically, her precocity is the result of internalized sexism and heteronormativity. The book threatens women with husbands and makes their gendered roles a punishment, which is valid, but never considers that people internalize the standards they're judged by, and that a girl growing up in a world where women are only valuable as objects of sexual desire would want to make herself valuable, desired. Perhaps this is intentional, a generation illustration of a society growing increasingly sexist? Perhaps it is readdressed or resolved later. But what it feels like is one part a missed opportunity to further engage in feminist criticism and one part so gross oh my god.
