Book Review – The Mad Ship
Author: Robin Hobb
Cover Artist: John Howe
Publisher: Voyager
Binding: Mass Market Paperback
Publication Date: 2000
The second book in Hobb’s Liveship Traders trilogy. I reread this book during my recent move and had to drag myself away repeatedly to see to such trivial details as packing. Like the first book in this trilogy The Mad Ship is a very good book.
The end of book one sees Pirate captain Kennit in possession of the Vestrit family’s liveship Vivacia. Back in Bingtown things are going little better for their family. Only the supposed revenue of the Vivacia is keeping the creditors at bay for the moment. The tensions between the Old Trader families and the newcomers keeps mounting but the Vestrits are too preoccupied to take much notice. Not until the news hits Bingtown that the Vivacia has been taken at least. Then the Vestrit family finds out how desperate things have become for their own class, and with how little support that leaves them.
The people that colonized the Cursed Shores where all other attempts failed are not the type to roll over and die though. With the help of the mysterious beadmaker Amber and the renagade trader’s son Brashen, Althea Vestrit convinced the Ludluck family the sell their mad Liveship Paragon. accused of having killed his crew on several occasions Paragon has been beached for decades but with their backs to the wall their choices are limited. Paragon is refitted and takes off in search of Kennit and the Vivacia.
Aboard the Vivacia Althea’s nephew Wintrow is fighting back in his own way. He struggles to hang on the beliefs he’s been raised with and above all to save the bond he shares with the Liveship. Kennit tries to win the boy over to his way of thinking. Kennit has lost nothing of his ambition to become King of the Pirate Isles and works tirelessly to achieve this goal.
Even further south the decadent Satrap of Jamalia is hounded by his advisor on Bingtown affairs to respect the old charter that defines the ties between Jamalia and Bingtown. Too caught up to chasing his pleasures to notice the severity of the situation the Satrap takes his advisor by surprise and decides to travel to Bingtown to settle the matter personally. Escorted by his Chalcedean allies the Satrap sets sail, taking with him all the political intrigue in the Jamalian court. Unwittingly the Satrap provides the flame that may cause the powderkeg that is Bingtown to explode.
As if the situation wasn’t bad enough already, unknown to the inhabitants of Bingtown, an even greater threat to the way of life of the Old Traders is emerging. The link between Liveships, the Rain Wild Traders, the secret of wizardwood and the sea serpents massing near the mouth of the Rain Wild River is slowly unravelling. While less obvious than the political tensions in and around Bingtown, this development potentially has a far greater impact.
As you can see from the summary Hobb is juggling an awful lot of story lines in this book. Inevitably it turned out to be a book of considerable size. Personally I think Hobb handles it very well, The Mad Ship adds quite a bit to the main character. The character development in Ship of Magic was the one minor flaw in first book in my opinion. Perhaps because I got used to Hobb writing in first person perspective in the Farseer trilogy. Some people will disagree with me and say the book drags a bit in places and that there is too much emphasis on outlining the political situation in various parts of the world. It is a matter of taste I suppose. I for one think that The Mad Ship is a supurb example of multiple point of view epic fantasy. In fact I suspect George R.R. Martin is jealous.
I could compare the two books but there wouldn’t be any point. In The Mad Ship Hobb builds on the foundation she laid in Ship of Magic. If anything it is a more complex that it’s predecessor. All you really need to know about it is that it lives up to the standard set in Ship of Magic. If epic fantasy is your thing, this trilogy is a must. I’d be halfway though the third book if I could remember which box I packed it in.
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