r/Fantasy • u/Low_Page1929 • 13h ago
Magic ships
Books with medieval ships that are magical? Robin Hobb, I know about that. Are there any else?
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u/cwx149 13h ago edited 13h ago
One half of The Elder Empire series by Will Wight features the captain of a special magical ship he's soulbound to the ship and it's "powered" (I'm using the term loosely and in multiple context) by a giant sea monster thing. I didn't finish this series yet so I don't know how good they are
Not exactly a regular medieval ship but the air ships in butcher's cinder spires series are kinda magical? They have all kinds of steam punk esque equipment that lets them fly but they can sail on wind currents but they usually fly using aether currents minor vague spoilers there is some kind of implication that the ship is "alive" but it hasnt really been fully explained
Both of these are more age of sail than medieval I would say especially cinder spires
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u/spike31875 Reading Champion V 13h ago
The Winter Sea trilogy by HM Long has ships with figureheads carved out of sentient trees: that tree spirit becomes the embodiment of the ship. They can manifest a visible form which allows them to interact with people on board. They can even leave their ship for short periods to interact with people & other sentient ships nearby.
It's a cool series which was excellent on audio. It was narrated by 2 of my favorite narrators: Samuel Roukin & Moira Quirk.
I don't think the ships are like medieval ones, though: I think they're more like the ships of the late 1700s & early 1800s from the descriptions.
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u/ArchStanton75 12h ago
If you don’t mind steampunk, try Jim Butcher’s steampunk fantasy The Aeronaut’s Windlass. It’s a fun far cry from Harry Dresden.
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u/Baelspar 12h ago
In Dennis Mckiernan's The Voyage of the Fox Rider, there is a ship that is special. I'm not sure that it's magical, but its origins are fairly unique.
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u/DunBanner 8h ago
It's not mediaeval but The Ship of Ishtar by Abraham Merritt is about 2 ancient gods trapped on a ship warring for eternity.
You can listen to the Oasis published audiobook and print edition published by DMR books as both versions contain the unedited text.
It was written in the 1920's so expect some dated writing but the book's fantasy imagery, weird characters still holds up.
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u/Rhubarb776 12h ago
In Dread Pirate Arcanist, there’s a pirate ship made of magical wood that creates a fog bank so the ship can’t be seen. It was very cool.
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u/night_in_the_ruts 10h ago
E.M. Kkoulla - Ships of Britannia series
The Roman gods are real, and their empire never ended. There are magic, sentient ships.
I've read most of the series, it's pretty good.
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u/Book_Slut_90 Reading Champion 2h ago
Chronicles of the Imaginarium Geographica by I think the author is James Owen or Owens has lots of magical ships ranging from Ancient Greek to futuristic.
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u/ColeDeschain 13h ago edited 13h ago
RJ Barker's Tide Child trilogy is... not quite "medieval ships that are magical," but it's a very good roughly-medieval-renaissance tech level inspired by 19th century naval practice, with weird variations on technology and magical stuff in the story.