Ship of Magic (Liveship Traders Series #1) » (BANTAM PBK)

Robin Hobb is the author of the Farseer, Liveship Traders, and Tawny Man trilogies. She has also written as Megan Lindholm. She currently resides in Tacoma, Washington.

Bingtown is a hub of exotic trade and home to a merchant nobility famed for its liveships—rare vessels carved from wizardwood, which ripens magically into sentient awareness. The fortunes of one of Bingtown's oldest families rest on the newly awakened liveship Vivacia.

For Althea Vestrit, the ship is her rightful legacy unjustly denied her—a legacy she will risk anything to reclaim. For Althea's young nephew Wintrow, wrenched from his religious studies and forced to serve aboard ship, Vivacia is a life sentence.

But the fate of the Vestrit family—and the ship—may ultimately lie in the hands of an outsider. The ruthless pirate Kennit seeks a way to seize power over all the denizens of the Pirate Isles...and the first step of his plan requires him to capture his own liveship and bend it to his will....

VOYA

A liveship, made of mysterious wizardwood, can sail like no other. Each ship, built for one specific family, will only respond properly under a family member's direction. The liveship Vivacia should be making the fortune of the Vestrit family, whom we first meet shortly before Captain Ephron dies while aboard, quickening the ship to her full potential. It appears the family will be able to repay its huge debt with Althea, Ephron's second daughter, sailing the ship. However, politics and policies interfere. Acting captain Kyle, Ephron's first daughter's husband, bans Althea from her own ship. Shocked, she flees her family and society's expectations in a desperate bid to regain the Vivacia. Because he is not a Vestrit by blood, Kyle calls for his son Wintrow, a priest of Sa, who has no knowledge of sailing or desire to leave his vocation. Attempting to escape his fate, Wintrow flees the ship. Wintrow's sister Malta is made of sterner stuff, like most Vestrit women, but she is very young and selfish. Her shenanigans immerse the family into worse political and financial problems. As the Vestrit family struggles to make its fortune, so does the pirate Kennit. His two overwhelming desires are to become King of the Pirates, and to own a liveship. The Vestrits's adventures are skillfully interwoven with those of Kennit and his pirate crew and issues of human rights, religion, politics, and tradition versus innovation. The reader is constantly drawn along in this complex but well-knit plot, anticipating resolution but often surprised by a new twist of events. As this first book in the Liveship Traders series nears its conclusion, several new elements are introduced but not resolved. This rollicking tale will leave readers hungering for the next installment. VOYA Codes: 3Q 2P S (Readable without serious defects, For the YA with a special interest in the subject, Senior High-defined as grades 10 to 12).