[Master Prudent]

This is Robin Hobb's second series and, while it is meant to be set in the same universe as her first series the only connection is the mystery of the dragons and elderlings and what happend to them.

The story follows the fortunes of the Vesitrit trader family and a priate captain. As the story opens the Vesitrits have awakened their first liveship (as it says - a living ship) and their fortunes seem to be on the rise, however the new man of the household wants to use the ship to trade slaves and a certain pirate captain is intent on aquiring a liveship. Over it all hangs the mystery of the liveship's sentience.

The series has a genuinely engaging mystery and the characterisation is good - though some characters are drawn better than others. The series is superbly plotted and paced - this is its prime strenght. Although the best thing for long term fantasy fans is that it avoids many of the cliches of the genre.

In case you haven't guessed the verdict it is an excellent series and heartily recommended.

(Apologies for the spelling)

[Morgoth]

I detested it. I was so dissapointed to find that Hobb had gone from the first person perspective. A perspective she does better than most other authors I've read. I was also very anoyed by the way the story in the liveship traders follows a much more stereothypical fantasy formula than the assassin trilogy did. There were so many clichés I gritted my teeth several times.

My verdict would be that this is the kind of series usualy enjoyed by those who like stereothypical fantasy with more Brooks/Eddings like storylines.

[Werthead]

It was good. It wiped the floor with Farseer, which was certainly the most boring fantasy series I'd read in a while. The characters were great and the worldbuilding (Hobbs' biggest flaw) was less cliched. However, the series was overlong and it did kind of go round and round in circles for a while. And agreed, Hobb is incapable of writing a barstorming, great climax to a series.

[Matrim]

I love Liveship Traders. Sure, it's not the most original series out there but I would never compare it to Eddings and Brooks. And Hobb's character development is second to none, period. I was so affected by these books that there were periods when I just stopped reading for no other reason but simply because I feared that some of the characters would get into even further trouble. And I actually liked the ending, although it was rushed.

[Valgard]

I must admit that I loved the farseer trilogy they were great. But when it came to the lIveship series I got half way through the first book and hated it nothing made me want to keep on reading. Tried the Tawny man read book one it was ok but nothing special and I have not picked up the next two as have had no urge to other better things to read out there (e.g. erikson and bakker again before release of next books).

[Morgoth]

I really enjoyed the Farseer trilogy, as well as the tawny man trilogy. Both of which are excellent works of fantasy in my eyes. I think Hobb's endings are one of her strenghts.

The liveships books bothered me greatly, and I'll never accept them to be anything but borderlining between crap and mediocre

[ObsoleteResolve]

Yeah, I've read the Farseer and Tawny Man Trilogies, liked them (Farseer better than Tawny Man by far). Couldn't even trudge through the first book of the Liveship Traders. Just... meh. Bored me to tears.

.david

[QuickTidal]

Haven't read the Liveship series, and don't really care to, but I did read the Farseer series and Tawny Man series. Loved Farseer and thought it ended perfectly! However, to take how she ended Farseer (relationships-wise) and give everyone the predictable ending that I was pleasantly surprised WASN'T at the end of Farseer, but then it almost seemed like a cop-out to let Tawny Man end with *ahem* those two ending up together.....I thought it a shame...but then I am an Anime freak and LOVE the japanese ideal mof ending things on a bittersweet note.

[Kallor]

i enjoyed the liveship trilogy more than the first farseer trilogy, though i haven't read the second series

[QuickTidal]

Harold Bloom said:

I skipped the Liveship trilogy and moved on to Fool's Errand. Hopefully it speeds up because it lacks the depth to justify this pace. Hobb's books are a guilty pleasure I guess, but almost everything from the fantasy section is.

Speaking of guilty pleasures, it's nice to find another anime fan here! If you haven't already, watch Elfen Lied!

Yeah, Fools Errand doesn't get interesting until Fitz finally leaves the cabin and goes to Buckeep, which is about half way through.

Yeah, I've seen Elfen Lied. Tonight my friends are coming over for my b-day celebration and every year I make them all watch anime....tonight it's either gonna be Steamboy, Eva: Death & Rebirth (cause it's always good to melt peoples mind with the genius of Hideaki Anno), and or some Samurai Champloo.

[Master Prudent]

She wrote under the name Megan Lindholm?! What did Megan Lindholm write?

[Bucklund]

She wrote the Reindeer people and Wolfs brother along with the KI and Vandien quartet. Theres probably a few others but theyve all been out of print for some years now so theyre hard to find but well worth the read if you can get hold of them.
As for the Liveship Traders I startred reading it about a year after finishing Tawny man. I didnt find it as emotionally involving as the Farseer or Tawny man series and at first Wintrows religious rambling and Malta and Altheas self centered attitudes nearly put me off. But I did find it had me hooked and by the middle of book 2 I found I actually cared about what happened to the characters. Even the bad ones. So as the original poster said Liveships is well worth reading once you get into it and Id reccomend it to anyone who likes Hobbs work.

[Lorn]

Just gave up reading the first book in the Liveships Traders, it bored me too much and I didn't find one single character I liked/enjoyed reading about. Didn't like the Farseer trilogy either but everyone keeps going on about what a good author she is so I thought one of her other series maybe were better. Ah well I think I'm done with Hobb. You can't like every author.