Reviews with content warning for Sexual violence - Ninth House

I found the description of Yale to be distracting, I couldn’t really get into the setting. But Bardugo graduated from Yale so that must be why. I think I was expecting a hard magic system since I was disappointed that many magic items from Lethe came out of nowhere to do exactly what she needed. But the main story is Alex. And Darlington’s. Two lonely people who have been abandoned in different ways.

Sandow took advantage of both. Speaking of Sandow, Bardugo added enough context for readers to piece together the murder mystery, and I love that. While I found Belbalm to be very suspicious and possibly working with Sandow, how could anyone piece together what she was up to? We needed more of Daisy’s background for this to land.

I loved Darlington and Alex’s growth. Dawes really grew on me too!

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miaqt's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark mysterious medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

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raegandchambers's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

Okay, I want to preface this by saying I loved the plot and the story. I read the Familiar first and was nervous about Ninth House because I was afraid it would have the same type of ending. Let me say the ending was amazing. The story felt well thought out. The prose was amazing. This story was great!

HOWEVER and this is a big however the way in which the sexually explicit scenes were handled was bad. There were ways to go about telling that part of the story without going into that much detail. I didn't read reviews or look up trigger warnings and I wish I would have. After I read two of the three scenes I had to put the book down and watch some wholesome videos. I didn't know if I would finish the book because of them. Ultimately I am glad that I did because I enjoyed the rest of the plot. But I wish I had known so that I would have been prepared. However because of that I am not able to give this book too high of a rating and I know that is a personal issue. But it really really threw me off.

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heytheredelcine3's review against another edition

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dark mysterious tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

The twist at the end was interesting. The ending was a little rushed.

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robinlovesrain's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

I didn't really feel gripped by this book until about halfway through - the pacing up front was a little slow, and there's a lot to learn about the world. But at about that halfway point, something tipped, and once the book had me, it HAD me. Dark and mysterious and violent and magical. Really really great read.

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morgash's review against another edition

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More of a horror fantasy than a mystery fantasy like I thought.

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