Reviews tagging 'Animal death'

Nona the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir

25 reviews

symbio's review against another edition

adventurous challenging funny mysterious fast-paced

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

5.0

This book is a sigh of relief after the tension of the previous book, but it is very much the calm before the storm, and we see only the very beginning of that storm in the epilogue. Nona as a narrator is a breath of fresh air; she’s clueless and clumsy, but so full of love it radiates to everyone who touches her. 

Dramatic irony is central to the book. There are no slap to the face reveals like in previous books; instead, each reveal is a gentle confirmation of suspicions the astute reader could garner from previous installments. Muir again proves that something being predictable is rewarding when done well. 

Unlike its predecessor, Nona gets more confusing toward the end of the book as the conclusion reveals itself. Go ahead and strap in for faces new and familiar and souls familiar and foreign. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Blood, and Gun violence

Moderate: Animal death

Minor: Cannibalism, Vomit, and Medical content

btrz7's review against another edition

dark medium-paced

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Animal death, Blood, and Gore

jjjreads's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional funny mysterious sad tense medium-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Chronic illness, Classism, Colonisation, Confinement, Cursing, Death, Dysphoria, Eating disorder, Fire/Fire injury, Gaslighting, Genocide, Gore, Grief, Murder, Medical trauma, Panic attacks/disorders, Suicidal thoughts, Toxic friendship, Abandonment, Blood, Body horror, Bullying, Car accident, Gun violence, Injury/Injury detail, Medical content, Mental illness, Police brutality, Self harm, Terminal illness, Kidnapping, and Mass/school shootings

Moderate: Alcohol, Animal death, Deadnaming, Excrement, Animal cruelty, Cursing, Death of parent, Drug use, Fire/Fire injury, Hate crime, and Vomit

Minor: Abortion, Car accident, Pregnancy, Toxic friendship, and Xenophobia

iviarelle's review against another edition

adventurous emotional funny mysterious reflective 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? It's complicated

5.0

As much as Harrow the Ninth (the book) sometimes felt like an impenetrable puzzle box on the first read, Nona's life was never particularly opaque to me. Sure, there are questions adjacent to her, in fact all of the questions are adjacent to her, but I never felt frustrated by the way the information was withheld, even though the structure is very similar to Harrow's book went.

On a related note, I think it's an incredible achievement that Muir split this book off from Alecto the Ninth, where it was supposed to have just been the first third-to-half of the book, without making it FEEL like an incomplete story. Maybe part of that is down to how different Harrow felt from Gideon, setting us up for each book to be a slightly disjointed story about different but related characters within this world. Either way, nothing about this book is a disappointment, and the split point isn't as jarring as they often are when books are torn in half like this.

It's hard to say much more than that without spoilers. I'm so pleased with how this one played out, even with the questions I don't feel have satisfactory answers yet, and I'm looking intensely forward to Alecto.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gun violence, Vomit, Colonisation, Murder, Panic attacks/disorders, Violence, Animal death, Body horror, Cursing, Death, Chronic illness, Eating disorder, Medical content, War, Blood, Gore, Injury/Injury detail, Self harm, and Terminal illness

Moderate: Addiction, Confinement, Fire/Fire injury, Kidnapping, Mental illness, Religious bigotry, Alcohol, Bullying, Drug use, Deadnaming, Grief, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Suicidal thoughts, Cancer, and Forced institutionalization

Minor: Gaslighting

uranaishi's review against another edition

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

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Blood, Car accident, Confinement, Death, Eating disorder, Gun violence, Injury/Injury detail, Kidnapping, and War

Moderate: Fire/Fire injury, Religious bigotry, Child death, Cursing, Police brutality, Terminal illness, Gore, Grief, Mass/school shootings, Medical content, Genocide, Mental illness, Animal death, Panic attacks/disorders, Toxic friendship, Xenophobia, Chronic illness, and Death of parent

Minor: Trafficking, Vomit, Abandonment, Body horror, Child abuse, Alcohol, Bullying, Drug use, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Sexual content, and Transphobia