A review by ceruleanshelves
Nona the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir

adventurous challenging dark emotional funny mysterious reflective 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? It's complicated

5.0

“We are one flesh.”
“I am your end.”

you guys... i seriously cannot believe how fucking good this series is. it's taken over my mind.

(spoilers for gideon the ninth and harrow the ninth for my review, just fyi)

picking up a few months after HtN, we follow nona, who is assumably in harrow's body... but who is she? 

nona is a loveable, wonderful protagonist and for a good portion of the book it's a bit of a relief from the high tension of GtN and HtN, instead focusing on nona's day to day on a strange, pre- (or maybe mid?) apocalyptic refugee planet, which is experiencing political unrest and turmoil from both blood of eden and the emperor's reign.

Sounds like the start of a joke, right? Two scientists, an engineer, a detective, a lawyer, and an artist walk into a bar to help me become God.

interspersed between nona's day to day are scenes with john gaia as we slowly uncover the final days before the great resurrection 10,000 years prior which has lead to the current circumstances. john gaia is delightfully complicated as a villain, as is ianthe i found in this book. i wasn't expecting that from her from (what i at least thought was) fan worship, but maybe that's also the appeal. and of course, we still get to enjoy muir's excellent humor:

He sighed and said, “We had the internet. We decided to stream.” She said, “What is this internet?” And he said, “See, I did make a utopia.”

“What if I don’t like me?” she said. But Pyrrha didn’t seem to understand. “Well, you’ll probably start visiting clubs and trying to hit on the dancers, and going from relationship to relationship not really being able to commit.”

“What does it mean to love God?” “Decent dinner and a bottle of average rosé. Maybe a movie. I’m not picky,” he said.

as with HtN, the curtain is pulled back more and we're able to piece together more information about this complicated universe muir has written for us. there were some excellent twists, turns, and revelations, but muir would never leave us off without more questions and a cliffhanger ending.

We didn’t even do it right … we were children—playing with the reflections of stars in a pool of water … thinking it was space.”

at this point so far, this could end up possibly being my all-time favorite series depending on how the last book(s) go. here's to hoping alecto doesn't let us down!
Expand filter menu Content Warnings