Robin Hobb certainly knows how to give her chacters a hard time. Not one of the main characters survives without some life-changing injury or psychological trauma. While this is an effective way of adding depth to the narration, it doesn't make comfortable reading, as every catastrophe inevitably leads to the next, even worse one.
On the other hand, Hobb writes enviably lucid and fluent prose, and has all the makings of a master storyteller. Once the reader gets swept up into the swell of the story it's hard to resist its pull.
Compared to the Farseer trilogy this book has a major shortcoming, however: its lacks really strong central characters which made the Assassin books a rare achivement in the field of fantasy. Whereas in the Farseers, Hobb had managed to create offbeat characters like the Fool, Ship of Magic is mostly peopled with stereotypes.
If the next book of the Liveship trilogy turns up on my doorstep I will probably pick it up and read it. Otherwise I am not all that interested what will happen to the characters during the next 2000 pages or so, and in the meanwhile will look for something more original to read.
