"The Liveship Traders" - full set
A review of "The Liveship Traders", (trilogy), by Robin Hobb, (real name: Margaret Ogden)
Weighing in at over 2200 pages with cover art by John Howe, and a sweeping canvas dealing with family, love, politics and inter-species cooperation, this trilogy appears from the outside to be novel, stylish and interesting. Sadly however, appearances can be deceptive and this is just another planned, manipulative soap opera for girls of the type that has been done to death ten thousand times. The only difference here is that this time there is the novel concept of live ships. There are also sailors, dragons, slaves, merchants and a Satrap, but that has all been done before… many times!
I will come to the mind-numbing plot and character development later but first let me consider the matter of the writer’s literary style. On the front cover of the books you can see that: SFX says that “Robin Hobb writes achingly well” and that George RR Martin considers that it is “Even better than the Assassin books. I didn’t think that was possible”. More accurate would have been: “Robin Hobb’s writing causes an ache” and this trilogy is “Even worse than the Assassin books, I didn’t think that was possible”.
Consider the following:
’Can we afford that?’ Keffria asked.
’Only just. If we are willing to eat simply and live simply. I’m almost embarrassed to say how grateful and relieved I am that she offered. I felt so guilty letting her go. Most families want a young woman to watch over their children…’
or perhaps this:
Two steps brought him to Wintrow’s side, where the boy now more held than threatened the man. As gently as if he were picking up a sleeping infant, the burly mate eased his arms about the captain..
The smile he gave Wintrow showed him more teeth than a bulldog’s snarl.
Not exactly Pulitzer prize winning stuff. Short simple sentences, numerous non sequiturs and a laughably unrealistic, manufactured dialog. Ms Ogden has all the literary fluency, range and originality of a secondary school maths teacher.
Now let me get to what really irritates me about this work: The characterisation, especially the males.
If you want evidence that this is a book for girls, apart from the fact that the writer is female, just have a look at the major players. We have:
Check them out: what a selection of positive, tough, resourceful and powerful females.
What about the men. Well we have:
You can look at the numbers of each sex and claim that each sex gets a fair go, but look at the qualities. At least half the men are horrific, evil beings, especially the physically big men who tend to be typecast as sadistic brutes. Looking at this from a psychological viewpoint one would have to wonder whether Ms Ogden was raped by a large man, or perhaps her father was a brute? Or is she simply pandering to women who have been thus abused? Whatever the explanation, there is no doubt that men are badly represented here. The main male character: Wintrow Vestrit is the most heroic, but he is also the smallest, youngest and most spiritual. What does this say about the author? That she can’t deal with a full grown male? Sad really, to think that a love story for girls should be written by a woman who can’t love real men.
Contrast this motley collection of male failures, many of whom die during the tale, with the alluring and varied array of female role models, ALL of whom are either perfect to begin with or are redeemed in the course of the work. I’m all in favour of some positive female role models but this blatant post-feminist bias is absurd! Most big men I know are not bullies, and sure as shit, this world contains a lot of small minded, selfish, ignorant bitches.
Not only is this bias pathetically unrealistic, which detracts from any literary merit the book may have had, but it is also insulting to the entirety of the male sex. Perhaps Margaret Ogden hates men so much that she doesn’t care if they don’t buy her books but I doubt her publishers would think this way. More subtly her more discerning and less damaged female readers would also be repelled by this bias. A big black mark for this flaw Maggie!
Having dealt with the 2 dimensional, colour by numbers characterisation it is time to deal with the 2 dimensional colour by numbers plot. Despite Ms Ogden’s claim that her characters and plot have a life of their own and grow in the writing, this book has the feel from page 1 that it has all been carefully put together to deliberately manipulate the reader’s emotions. A practice that I abhor!
The book begins with the death of the main character’s father, the betrayal by her own mother, the wrongful deprivation of her birthright and her mistreatment at the hands of her brother in law, all in short order. A blatant piece of manipulation designed to make you cry out in sympathy at the injustice that has been done. It also sets you up to enjoy the revenge and restoration that you know will come at the end of the book. This set up desire for revenge is a well worn device to keep you reading, (and buying), til the end.
And this approach is used for all the worthy characters who have ALL been wronged. Whether it is Wintrow, whose father is absurdly cruel, or the poor sea serpents who can’t remember, or Brashen, disowned and unfairly thrown of his ship, or Paragon, who has been so mistreated he has gone mad. The list just goes on and on and on. All victims, all waiting for the justice that you know must come at the end of the book. All you have to do is keep reading.
Manipulative plot and character creation of the most obvious and contemptible kind. It’s enough to make you sick! Another black mark.
The content of this book stamps it as written by a female. Large slabs of it are tied up in dialogue with women positioning themselves in domestic and political power struggles. I understand that this is a female trait and as such it is valid, but it bores the crap out of me. I’m a man, let’s just get on with the action! I won’t give a black mark for this, but it does backup my belief that women write books for women and men write books for men. Not much anyone can do about this but I do think Ms Ogden should change the spelling of her pseudonym to Robyn, so that everyone knows the writer is female.
Oddly enough, (and this shows how weak she is as a writer), Margaret Ogden does not make the most of the revenge and restoration motif at the end. Considering how long drawn out and insufferable the bad side of the setup is, a balanced author should provide a similarly long and joyous conclusion, (as Tolkien does in LOTR), but this is not the case here. In particular, the metamorphosis of the dragons is poorly handled. It is clear as crystal that the book should ended with the maiden flight of the hatchlings. The final line should have read: “and they watched the young dragons fly up and up into the azure sky until they became just dots, and then disappeared. ‘Let’s go home’, said Reyne.” It should have ended thus. But it doesn’t. Poor writing, even at the mechanical level.
So the style is poor, the plot is transparent, the characters are typecast and the mechanics are ordinary… is there anything good about this book? Hmmm, hard to find much. The plot is the best part. Although it doesn’t deliver the originality and twists that I expected, nevertheless it kept me going to the end, (sometimes through gritted teeth). I found the symbiosis between humans and dragons the most interesting aspect, although this has been done to death already by Anne McCaffrey. The use of dragon cocoons to make liveships is an intriguing new aspect, but I would have preferred a little more originality than just that.
So can Margaret Ogden write? Only in the sense that she has the discipline to construct a saleable plot and stick to it, filling in the words, day after day, month after month, until she has 2200 pages. There’s no art in it, few new ideas and no lasting value. This is the tragic reality of the fantasy genre today: predigested, made in America, recyclable pulp for the undiscerning female reader. Tolkien and Vance have set the benchmark here but sadly it is this kind of drivel that fills the fantasy shelves in our local book stores today. Mills & Boon meets Sword & Sorcery.
If you’re a girl, read it if you must. If you’re a male, AVOID!
1/5
Warren Mars - August 27, 2008