Ship of Magic

Robin Hobb is quite the master of the slow burn. This entire book is basically just there to set up the characters and their history and their motivations, and only at the end it all comes crashing down. Sort of. A bunch of things happen right before the end and then it's over.
I'm not sure I'd be jumping with excitement to get to the sequel if it hadn't been for the Realm of the Elderlings connection, but I hear it gets really great, and the characters are all pretty well developed (even if I don't like a great deal of them), and I am actually pretty curious on where it's all going next.