Liveship Traders Trilogy

A nautical fantasy featuring pirates, dragons, and magic? What's not to love? To top it off, Liveship Traders is filled with fantastic women. Ronica, the widow of the liveship's former captain is independent, resourceful, and instrumental in galvanizing her town in the face of disaster.  Her daughters, Keffria and Althea, and Granddaughter Malta, all have complex paths to walk, some only to be fleshed out in other series. All are interesting and complicated and central to the story. Even the liveship herself is a character, really. The people in this book are so well-fleshed out and grow so much throughout the trilogy; heroes might become villains and vice versa, you just never know where their paths will lead. Rape comes up in this series, but isn't introduced as some sensationalistic device as some male writers tend to do; it's realistic and gritty, but Hobb addresses the very real struggle of how rape is perceived in society, and how victims can go on to rebuild their lives after trauma. ]She weaves an incredible story told from multiple perspectives, creating layers of mystery and adventure. Each time she peels back one layer to reveal one mystery of the liveships, she reveals another. The intertwining of this series with all her others (Farseer, Rainwilds, The Elderlings) is just masterful and leaves no ends loose or without purpose.