Shaman's Crossing, newest book by Robin Hobb

[Peter Ahlstrom]

I read this a couple months ago, and Brandon's cover quote thread reminded me that I'd never said anything about it.

Has anyone else read this book? I found the universe very interesting, and the characterization quite good, but I found the plot almost unbearably slow. It took forever to figure out what the book was about. Finally things picked up toward the end for a quite good last quarter of the book or so, with a good end for the first volume, though continuation is obviously necessary and planned.

I would say this is the weakest so far of all the "Robin Hobb" books I've read--all 10 of them, not including the Megan Lindholm books, as I haven't read those. It didn't have the okay-now-I-know-what-I'm-doing-with-this-universe-so-let's-ignore-or-significantly-alter-the-tone-of-various-plot-elements-from-the-first-two-books-because-I've-written-myself-into-a-corner thing that went on with book 3 of the Farseer trilogy--she clearly has a better hand on what she wants to do with this universe than she did with that one--but this book by far has too much of the "eternal" part of the eternal apprentice in it.

[stacer]

I got an ARC of this at ALA last year, but still haven't read it. Too many books top the list over it of books I need to read. I'll get to it someday, maybe. I've actually never read any Robin Hobb, to be honest.

[Skar]

To hijack this thread a little bit, Ookla's comments about Shaman's Crossing reminded me of exactly how I felt about "Jonathon Strange & Mr. Norell" to wit:

but I found the plot almost unbearably slow. It took forever to figure out what the book was about. Finally things picked up toward the end for a quite good last quarter of the book or so

Am I the only one?

[Entsuropi]

I found the last part of Mr Norrel to be the worst. The bits in wellingtons army were really good.

[Nessa]

I found the plot almost unbearably slow.

Some of the Farseer books are slow too (although the plot is obvious). So much traveling gets tedious. It just seems to be the way she writes, generally.

[Skar]

I found the last part of Mr Norrel to be the worst. The bits in wellingtons army were really good.

Yes.  I should have said about a quarter of the book was interesting rather than the last quarter.  The interesting quarter was scattered in small chunks throughout the book with the first quarter of the book containing almost none.

[Peter Ahlstrom]

There is already a thread on JS&MN, but I liked the whole book as it was--and I was listening to it on CD, so it was much longer. Yes, it was very long, but I was entertained throughout.

EDIT: More specifically, JS&MN was funny. Shaman's Crossing wasn't humorous at all.

[Shrain]

I haven't read any of Hobb, but I bought a PB of Ship of Magic because I decided to try her out. Good choice or no?

[Peter Ahlstrom]

Yes. That's the first book of the Liveship trilogy, which is my favorite trilogy of hers. It's not in first person, which allows for a richer world than her other trilogies. The Farseer (Assassin), Liveship (Ship), and Tawny Man (Fool) trilogies are all connected, with one character shared between them (though this character is never a viewpoint character), but you can safely read the Ship books on their own; they take place in a different part of the world.

You'd probably appreciate some of the subtleties better if you'd read the Assassin books first--the Fool books are a more direct sequel to the Assassin books, and a couple of the Ship characters show up briefly during the 2nd or 3rd Fool book, so reading order does have some importance--but the 2nd trilogy's writing is stronger in my opinion, and the 3rd book of the first trilogy is the weakest of the lot, so you might be less inclined to continue after reading that third book and might thus miss the great Liveship trilogy.

[Shrain]

Cool. Thanks Ookla. I think I'll read hers next. I was debating whether to go with her or the Elizabeth Hayden book I bought (Rhapsody) once I'm done with McCaffrey's Dragonquest.