The Bone Ships

I'm an absolute sucker for stories on ships. It's why I loved the second Locke Lamora book better than the first one. Unfortunately most of those stories leave me a bit wanting in the character department, as that setting is very ideal for some good dynamics, especially when it comes to loyalty and honor. The Bone Ships delivers in that regard.

To be honest, I wasn't always 100% sure of what was going on in the story (I'm still not sure why The Tide Child had to be the first to get to that particular destination?), but the characters more than made up for it. There's quite a few characters here, yet I have a feel for most of them, and I immediately know who's who and what type of person they are. Which is honestly weird, because most of the focus is on Joron and Meas, and yet you already get quite a good sense of the other characters with so little.

I found the character dynamics very believable. It's not weird that the crew's sense of loyalty for Meas grows throughout the story. It's not too sudden, and just right. Hell, I‘d follow Meas to hell and back. Joron himself also has some real good growth, and has some interesting relationships of his own as well.

Very much a “part one” though. The story that is set up here isn't resolved, but there is a clear sense of where it can go from here. And that has a lot of potential!