Reviews with content warning for Bullying - Ninth House

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Ninth House by Leigh Bardugo

100 reviews

kiwij96's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark mysterious sad tense medium-paced

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

4.0

This was a fantastic adult debut by Leigh Bardugo, I was genuinely impressed. It was a bit of a rocky start with the time jumps but about 80 pages in it definitely came into its own. Great magic system in the contemporary world, great mysteries surrounding the characters, and the plot twists were brilliant.

The concept for this book is well thought-out: Alex is a young girl plagued by ghosts, both metaphorical and literal, who finds herself with a free pass to one of the most prestigious universities as a result of her gift, and also where finds herself in the midst of at least 3 murder mysteries. However, at times the chapters were too long, paragraphs too clunky or generally too wordy. Her roommate characters were also super forgettable and definitely plot devices.

I would highly recommend checking your trigger warnings for this because there are some heavy topics and triggering scenes in here if you are unprepared.

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erupoo's review against another edition

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Got over half way through (10h12min, 7h51min left) and had to stop. Explicit and detailed descriptions of r*pe and SA, including with a child. Was very disappointed bc love Leigh Bardugo's other work but this ruined the book for me and prevented me finishing it. Would have been a great book otherwise. It was so unnecessary to include these.

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subtlyfurious's review against another edition

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Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

1.0

Never before have I read a book that so utterly fails to live up to its spectacular beginning.

The first few chapters are excellent (and the only reason I’m giving this book any stars). Bardugo weaves the character’s personalities and worldviews and backgrounds into the action flawlessly while also setting up a number of compelling topical themes.

It’s all downhill from there.

To me this feels like a YA book made “adult” by throwing in a bunch of disturbing content in for shock value alone. At first, I tried to give Bardugo the benefit of the doubt, believing she’d be able to give us a reason for why things weren’t just graphic, but borderline (or maybe fully) pornographic. But no. She fails to explore anything on a deeper level, speaking about complex issues such as classism, racism, and sexism without doing any work to ever dip below the surface. In fact, her ability to swerve away from actually choosing a side and stating an opinion is almost impressive.

Still, I pressed on thinking “surely Bardugo will find a way to wrap this up in a somewhat satisfying way.”

No.

The last 15% is a slog and (spoilers) the who that dunnit turn out to be both the most boring who-you-expect and the most throwaway character.

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mylazybones's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional mysterious 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? It's complicated

4.5

Leigh Bardugo has a way of spinning a mystery that makes me forget i’m turning pages and has me trying to resist the urge to let my eyes skip around the page to see what happens next. The beginning is rough, she throws a lot of names at you, but the web of misdirection she weaves is unmatched

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mc_castle's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious tense medium-paced

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

4.25

I don't know if I enjoyed it, but I was GRIPPED. It's was a blend of dark academia, fantasy, a commentary on the upper classes and a murder mystery. Everything bad that could happen to someone happened to the protagonist but with ghosts involved. Also was interesting pacing as it wasn't linear storytelling, especially at the beginning where you're thrown into a weird future telling ritual, where a group of students reach into a man's innards to predict the stock market prices. With NO context. I was very confused at first. Also why do college kids have so much power? Read to find out.

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trippyotter's review against another edition

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dark mysterious tense medium-paced

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

3.0

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fionamclary's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional mysterious medium-paced

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

4.0

The premise and plot of this book were excellently executed. Alex was a great main character, and I loved how she had a strong moral compass that still lead her to do grotesque things.

A couple minor but significant complaints:

The way Alex reacted to Darlington's behavior at the Manuscript party seemed odd considering she is a survivor of SA. While you could argue that she is sympathetic and understanding that the drug he got was a form of SA as well, considering how it affected him, that still doesn't make it reasonable that she'd just be fine with everything. This was jarring amidst Bardugo's otherwise decently sensitive and realistic portrayal of Alex as a SA survivor.

I found that Dawes was autism-coded, and that the way Alex describes her initially indicated that Alex dislikes her for her autistic traits. She seems annoyed by her adherence to rules, alienated by her single-minded focus, put off by her ever-present headphones and favoring the same comfortable clothes.

When Alex does finally get closer to Dawes, it's due to shared trauma, not because she sees that there's nothing wrong with the aspects of her that she was initially put off by.

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