Reviews tagging 'Pregnancy'

Harrow the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir

36 reviews

irisraerah's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional funny mysterious sad tense fast-paced

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

5.0

If you're looking for a book that's as awesome as it is confusing, Harrow is a great option, but you absolutely must read Gideon the Ninth first. I fell completely in love with Muir's world in this book. I'd thoughted I'd loved it before but that was a mere crush. A universe of goth and often gory magic that spends this book expanding on all of the above is exactly my cup of tea (though Harrow herself would pick a different comparison, being a fan of neither tea nor words under four syllables), all while I grew to care more and more about each of the characters involved.

Also, as a queer woman, there is something so deeply comfortable and affirming about reading a story like this, full of queer characters, relationships, and tragedy, but without queerness being the source of any tension or tragedy. Queerness is simply a fact of life in a way that feels like home, though I personally have never lived as part of a space faring necromantic society, and my swordplay has been limited to a single college fencing credit. 

A word of caution to the squeamish reader: gore and the aesthetics of gore feature strongly in this series, though this is a case where the book's cover should have warned you about that clearly enough. Despite the goriness, I find Muir's setting to actually be quite beautiful in the grotesque, and scenes that might be something of nightmare felt vivid and terrific.

Having praised the highbrow content, I'd be remiss to not mention the low: spoilers for jokes you'll want to be caught off guard by as you read them in read time.

How the hell did Muir pull off "choke me daddy," "none pizza with left beef," and "Hi, *double spoiler,* I'm Dad" in a serious book? I'm impressed.

 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Gore, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Mental illness, Blood, Death, Grief, Murder, and Violence

Moderate: Gun violence, Medical content, Suicide, and Death of parent

Minor: Alcohol, Cancer, Cannibalism, Colonisation, Sexual content, Toxic friendship, Vomit, War, Pregnancy, and Torture

msradiosilence's review against another edition

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Cursing, Gaslighting, Gore, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, Pregnancy, Toxic friendship, War, Blood, Body horror, Bullying, Cancer, Child abuse, Mental illness, Murder, Panic attacks/disorders, Suicide, Death, Alcohol, Alcoholism, Chronic illness, Colonisation, Death of parent, Emotional abuse, Fire/Fire injury, Gun violence, Infertility, Medical content, Miscarriage, Physical abuse, Self harm, Sexism, Sexual content, Terminal illness, Torture, Violence, and Vomit

devirtualized's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective tense medium-paced

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

5.0

This is a very special book. And by book I mean long, mind-bending, utterly beautiful poem - or love letter - or both.

I feel like I don’t have high enough praise to give this but I will try. This prose is otherworldly. It is a surreal and devastating painting of grief and it is a derisive remark and a dad joke all in one. There really is not a single word that goes to waste. 

Harrow is an intriguing & exquisite character, warped by pain and unanswered questions, but still resolute and sincere. She’s sharply clever but also, endearingly, dumb-as-rocks and a little or a lot pathetic because of it. And she’s kind of impossible not to love. Like practically everyone Harrow meets, I too have a strong case of Nonagesimitis. 

The character dynamics are unbelievably tantalizing, incomprehensible (complimentary) and endlessly entertaining - and much the same can be said for the plot. 

I think I probably have a lot more to say. I have many questions too but I really wouldn’t have it any other way. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Medical trauma, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, Mental illness, Murder, Violence, Blood, Cursing, Death, Gore, Panic attacks/disorders, and Vomit

Moderate: Gun violence, Child death, and Suicidal thoughts

Minor: Death of parent, Pregnancy, Sexual content, Cancer, and Suicide

thecatconstellation's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious 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

4.5

A wild, confusing, horrifying, wonderful ride. You have to go into this knowing you will not know what the fuck is going on half the time, and even when you figure out what’s going on, there’s still so much we don’t know. 

I love the tone, especially in the second half. The humor and references sprinkled in kill me. “…none House, with left grief.” made me LOL.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Injury/Injury detail, Body horror, Gore, and Violence

Moderate: Grief, Gun violence, Mental illness, Child death, Death of parent, Murder, Pregnancy, and Self harm

Minor: Abandonment, Sexual content, Suicide, Toxic relationship, Vomit, Alcohol, and Sexual assault

hedsek's review

challenging dark emotional mysterious tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

Really struggled through the first half, but the book does redeem itself. I enjoyed it a bit less than Gideon (probably because seeing the world through Harrow's eyes is a lot less fun), but I'm curious to see what the rest of the series brings. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Toxic friendship, Death, Gore, Mental illness, Blood, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Genocide, Grief, Eating disorder, Gaslighting, Murder, Violence, Vomit, and Fire/Fire injury

Minor: Infidelity, Panic attacks/disorders, Colonisation, Pregnancy, Alcohol, and Cursing

psitstorrie's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark mysterious 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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Gore, Murder, Violence, and Blood

Moderate: Gaslighting, Suicidal thoughts, Grief, Body horror, Terminal illness, Mental illness, Self harm, Cursing, and Eating disorder

Minor: Colonisation, Pregnancy, Excrement, and Genocide

boglord's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional funny mysterious sad tense slow-paced

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

4.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Injury/Injury detail, Toxic friendship, Gore, War, Blood, Death, Body horror, Genocide, Grief, Gun violence, Murder, Violence, and Vomit

Moderate: Alcohol, Cannibalism, Child abuse, Colonisation, Eating disorder, Emotional abuse, Abandonment, Cursing, Death of parent, and Gaslighting

Minor: Pregnancy, Religious bigotry, Suicidal thoughts, and Ableism

barrybj's review against another edition

medium-paced

5.0

what. the fuck.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Suicide, Suicidal thoughts, Violence, Toxic friendship, Toxic relationship, Self harm, Pregnancy, Gore, Suicide attempt, Sexual content, War, Vomit, and Schizophrenia/Psychosis

erebus53's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional funny lighthearted mysterious reflective 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

4.25

Necromages are fighting to save the universe from world-eating monsters, and that's not the weird bit. This is a labyrinthine ride through visceral fight scenes (with ... lots of viscera, and bones and connective tissues.. elaborate in the details thereof), half remembered memories or dubious reliability, weird hallucinations that often make almost sense, tea and gingernuts, backstory overheard in snippets lacking context, ribald humour, assassins, and spooky weird ghosty stuff.

There are times where I wish I was capable of reading proper, honest to goodness, paperback books, but seeing as I'm bound to Audiobooks due to my infirmities, all I can say is OUCH.
Tamsyn Muir writes with a sensual love of words, that does not make the content of her prose accessible to most people. To say it plainly - she uses big words, and weird words. a lot. I am well at home in anatomical and psychological textbooks, and literary critique; one  of my friends suggested that in conversation with me it would be easiest to carry a notebook to write down all the odd words I use  to look up later...  and even _I_ needed to read this with a dictionary nearby. It seems quite clear that the author was mauled or possibly traumatically wounded by a feral thesaurus as a child.

I'm sorry, Moira Quirk. Your work on this audio narration was ok,  but you fail to catch the Kiwi parlance. It sounds SO weird to hear kiwi idioms in your accent (we don't pronounce a$$ like that) and your attempt at te reo Māori words was wince-inducing. Thankfully that was only one line.

I'm doubling down on my comparison from the first book. This is definitely like an anime. Great chunks of this book feel a bit like watching Neon Genesis: Evangelion. A good proportion of the narrative is in second person perspective, which definitely leans hard into the claustrophobic and unhinged aesthetic. You spend the first half of the book trying to figure out why things in this book don't tally with the happenings in the previous book. That was kind of cool and didn't leave me feeling anywhere near as confused as I thought I would. There were enough breadcrumbs to keep me from feeling too lost in the woods.

Upside of the audiobook was the similarity I was amused by in the fast travel; I was reminded of Douglas Adams's, Hitchhiker's Guide, specifically his description of hyperspace, and the Infinite Improbability drive. "The River" having weird brain melting effects on a backdrop of a woman's voice calling out time-stamps felt so much like HHGTG with Trillian  in the Heart of Gold.

Many twists and turns, the reappearance (in various forms) of characters who were bumped off in the last book, the list at the front of the book of the dramatis personae (alive and dead) being actually useful, and a sense that you still don't know quite wtf is going on.. all leads me to think that the third book could go either way in my estimation. I'll have to see what it's like. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Self harm, Child death, Violence, Gun violence, Injury/Injury detail, Medical content, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Suicidal thoughts, Death of parent, Mental illness, Physical abuse, Vomit, Blood, Dementia, Dysphoria, Genocide, Grief, Pregnancy, Cursing, Death, Fire/Fire injury, Gore, Medical trauma, and Murder

Moderate: Panic attacks/disorders and Toxic friendship

Minor: Miscarriage

mossgoblins's review against another edition

challenging funny mysterious reflective tense medium-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

4.0

This book feels like a fever dream and I adore it. Definitely worth at least 2 reads. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Body horror, Injury/Injury detail, Death, Gun violence, Gore, Medical content, Murder, and Violence

Moderate: Cursing, Toxic relationship, Genocide, Pregnancy, Suicidal thoughts, Chronic illness, Grief, Terminal illness, Alcohol, Child death, and War