Reviews tagging 'Kidnapping'

Nona the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir

21 reviews

steph_weigle's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional funny mysterious sad tense slow-paced

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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Gore, Kidnapping, Religious bigotry, War, Eating disorder, Gun violence, Medical content, Death, Fire/Fire injury, Mental illness, Suicidal thoughts, Terminal illness, Colonisation, Injury/Injury detail, Cursing, Violence, and Body horror

bebidocrimes's review against another edition

adventurous emotional funny mysterious tense fast-paced

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

4.75

After HtN, Nona's perspective was like eating cotton candy, especially at the start. Oh we're going to school! There's a dog! She wears shirts with silly designs! Then you get Nona's No Good Very Bad Day that starts with getting kidnapped and ends with someone missing and, just like GtN, the plot keeps getting faster as we go along. This one has the purest feelings of grief, for loss and change and now it's all just sitting in my ribs keeping me company. I'll admit I forgot who was who in Blood of Eden except Wake and Suffer, so trying to follow their convos I really felt like Nona, dazed and confused. I am thrilled for Alecto, her rage was so visceral and I need MORE.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Grief, Cursing, Colonisation, Suicide, Violence, Kidnapping, Murder, Blood, Gun violence, Death, Gore, Injury/Injury detail, and War

Minor: Alcohol and Fire/Fire injury

iane_reads's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional funny lighthearted 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? Yes

4.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Chronic illness, Gun violence, Kidnapping, Gore, Grief, Hate crime, Medical content, Terminal illness, Suicide, Confinement, Blood, Violence, Xenophobia, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Death, Religious bigotry, Gaslighting, Mental illness, Murder, Toxic relationship, Racial slurs, Racism, Death of parent, Injury/Injury detail, Body horror, Cursing, Dysphoria, Eating disorder, Emotional abuse, Mass/school shootings, Suicidal thoughts, and Toxic friendship

Moderate: Car accident, Forced institutionalization, Abandonment, Genocide, Vomit, Trafficking, and Addiction

Minor: Cannibalism, Alcohol, Sexual content, Suicide attempt, Animal cruelty, and War

balina_elah's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional funny mysterious 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

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Injury/Injury detail, Blood, Grief, Death, Body horror, Violence, and Cursing

Moderate: Police brutality, Kidnapping, Eating disorder, and War

Minor: Bullying, Addiction, and Colonisation

lizziaha's review against another edition

• Loveable characters? Yes

4.25

There’s a LOT of genderfuckery going on here, and for that, I will always love this series. Other than the fact that this book differed from the first two, I feel like there’s not much I can say without delving into spoilers, so without further adieu—

y’all this rating might change after I read the last book, but my initial reading experience was sullied by the experience of being completely confused through 100% of the book. I spent so much time trying to figure out WHO Nona was and when we finally find out, then there’s other stuff going on that’s still confusing. And as lovely as Nona is, I missed the gideoness of the first two books. And I missed harrow’s tiny bomb of aggression. I missed bones and ninth’s badass goth aesthetic

One mostly spoiler free thing I loved about this book was getting a closer look at Camilla and Palamedes. It was interesting to learn their personalities and see the relationship between them. It was heartwarming really, with a healthy dose of angst, which is how I like all relationships. And speaking of, one thing about tamsyn muir is that she likes her relationships MESSY. And once again, I love that.

idk if this counts as a spoiler but i am, unfortunately, as it’s probably not canon, a camilla/coronabeth shipper

Honestly I’ve never been so excited to get into the fanfic as i was upon finishing this book. So overall, great book, liable to a higher rating on a reread when I’m less confused and more familiar with the characters. Catch me on ao3 next 🫡

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Content Warnings

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

Moderate: Vomit, War, Xenophobia, Grief, and Suicidal thoughts

Minor: Kidnapping

bruisedtigers's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional mysterious sad 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? It's complicated

3.25

I wanted to enjoy this much more than I did. It is very clear that this was not originally meant to be a full book, and initially I was fine with that. To start, it seemed like this just meant there would be extra time spent on building relationships and fleshing things out. This is partially true.

The real draw for this series is the characters, which are all very real and lovable in their own ways. However, the plotting for this one, while less dense than Harrow the Ninth, was frustrating in different ways. There seems to be a delight in obscurity for obscurity's sake, despite it adding nothing to the experience of the reader or the course of the plot. Not to say reader's need everything laid out, and some things can be inferred, but after three books of a protagonist in various states of 'not fully aware of what's going on,' I can't help but feel like Muir wants to be purposefully dodgy just for the sake of it. Sometimes it seems like an excuse to vaguely infer at a bigger plot rather than clearly hash out all the complicated details. Gideon knew nothing of necromancy, so a lot of the lyctor trials were beyond her. Harrow had her brain in pieces, so her perspective couldn't be trusted. Nona is blissfully naive, so we skim over a lot of what happens around her. Sure, the reader can figure it out, but does that add to the experience or is it just annoying? 

Then it ends with a sudden brevity that was absent for the rest of the leisurely developed book. We spend so long marinating in Nona, only for the climax to happen with barely twenty pages to spare. I know there's one more piece left, but it still feels strange. 

I do care for the characters, so I wish we focused on them properly, rather than vaguely imply around them. There's so many exciting ideas here hovering around, but they're not focused on. 

Also, far too many memes. None of them hit for me this time, even a little bit. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Injury/Injury detail, Grief, War, Violence, Kidnapping, Gore, Blood, Gun violence, Body horror, and Murder

softanimal's review against another edition

adventurous funny mysterious tense medium-paced

5.0

Once again Tamsyn Muir managed to write a character I found to be one of the most charming in all of fiction. I didn't think Gideon (the book or the character) could be outdone but here we are. I love Nona so much. Bless this book.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gun violence, Kidnapping, Body horror, Vomit, Fire/Fire injury, War, and Gore

booksthatburn's review against another edition

adventurous dark lighthearted mysterious medium-paced

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

4.5

NONA THE NINTH deals with a necromantic version of plurality in a way whose groundwork was laid in GIDEON THE NINTH and HARROW THE NINTH. Much as "one flesh, one end" is undeniably queer, Camila and Palamedes display a version of plurality, which is necromantic in its origins, but familiar to me in its general shape.  I’m a singlet, not a plural system, but several important people in my life are plural, and so much of how Nona interacts with Camilla and Palamedes echoes my interactions with those people in my own life. There’s a line in the second half of the book that makes it clear that at least some of the characters know about plurality, even if what’s happening with them is a specific magical version which canonically involves souls. In some ways plurality is more canonical to the text than any particular style of queerness (except perhaps for sapphic attraction), though this book (and the whole series) is undeniably and wonderfully queer.

The worldbuilding gets more of a chance to breathe this time around. GIDEON THE NINTH was a murder mystery until other things started being much more important. HARROW THE NINTH is a fever dream of confusion which suddenly snaps into coherence at the 90% mark. NONA THE NINTH is a breath, pausing for a story which has a clear framework, a lovable protagonist, and a sense of rhythm and pattern to her days. This calm amidst the storm is ripped open by a descent into war and the deterioration of her body as the day approaches when the Locked Tomb will open. I like the interludes as John tells the story of how this started. These sections helped with pacing and framing, as well as bringing the extremely welcome event of someone actually explaining what the fuck is going on for once. 

As the third book in the series, NONA THE NINTH continues Several things begun in earlier books, specifically, but not only, the fates of a great many characters such as Camila and Palamedes. There's so much in each book that it's very difficult to know which details will be picked up later and which ones have been completely handled in their first treatment, but this does eventually give some answers about things first raised in earlier books. There’s an entirely new storyline related to Nona, her relative newness, and everyone she cares about at home and the school. She’s just so happy in a way that incorporates strangeness and allows for a joking grotesquerie, effortlessly finding beauty in weirdness. It also leaves a huge thing for later, promising that the Locked Tomb will be opened, even counting down to that promised day before leaving the aftermath of its opening to be handled in the next book, ALECTO THE NINTH.

There are many fewer memes than the previous books, but the few that are in there are expertly chosen to devastating effect. There's one near the very end that I refuse to spoil which threads the needs between fantastically illustrating the meaning of the surrounding text and needing to be imperceptible to anyone not already in the know. I applaud the execution of it, even if by its nature it's frustrating that this is what the author decided to include. Masterfully done, I tip my cap.

As was the case for HARROW THE NINTH, if someone tried to read this as their introduction to the series, it would likely make sense almost all the way through... and then the ending would be strange and sideways because it relies on several things established in previous books as well as bringing many returning characters who have been more thoroughly introduced elsewhere. Also, the way that the John interludes are explaining how things came to be like this would be a bit strange without the grounding provided in GTN and HTN.

I think this is my favorite book in the whole series, and I'm looking forward to what ALECTO THE NINTH brings.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gore, Violence, Body horror, Blood, Murder, Death, and Eating disorder

Moderate: Injury/Injury detail, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Gun violence, Police brutality, Confinement, Medical content, Chronic illness, Cursing, Kidnapping, Vomit, Genocide, Terminal illness, Animal death, War, Death of parent, Self harm, and Fire/Fire injury

Minor: Alcohol, Cancer, Excrement, Sexual harassment, Car accident, Infertility, Domestic abuse, Suicide attempt, Torture, Ableism, Panic attacks/disorders, and Drug use

devirtualized's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional funny hopeful inspiring lighthearted mysterious reflective sad 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

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gore, Blood, Body horror, Grief, Cursing, Death, Injury/Injury detail, Murder, and Violence

Moderate: Gun violence, Kidnapping, Medical content, Mass/school shootings, Medical trauma, and Eating disorder

Minor: Alcohol, Sexual content, and Suicidal thoughts

elizmoe's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional funny mysterious tense fast-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

i read this book in less than two days even though, i cannot emphasize enough, i had a <i> lot </i> of other things to do. 

tamsyn muir, waht is WRONG WITH you. what is. what is WRONG. IS wrong??? with you??????????

in typical muir fashion, she transitions seamlessly to a new POV character, leaves the reader mostly in the dark, and continually throws crazy world-building stuff that you didn't even know you wanted to know. but you did. <i> really </i> want to know. 

essentially, this book answered many of the questions raised by Harrow the Ninth, but somehow ends up raising about a million more. 

was harrow's soul in alecto's body or did it get transferred to the river, and is it now on earth having a chat with john, or john's abandoned once-human soul?? what's gonna happen to harrow's body? was nona the personification of the earth's spirit or was she alecto or was she alecto AND alecto is the personification of  the earth? also, why is kiriona!gideon such a dick, and why is she friends with ianthe, sorta? who has her two-hander sword?? will tamsyn ever give us a griddlehark reunion that makes a lick of sense? will the next book have even more body/soul/etc swapping, and how is that even possible given the amount of bodily musical chairs was happening in this book? also, pAUL???????????????????????????

all i know for sure is that i am pre-ordering alecto right now and blocking off my calendar for the entire week of the release date.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Kidnapping, Body horror, Cursing, Eating disorder, Murder, Sexual harassment, War, Alcohol, Colonisation, Gore, Gun violence, Mental illness, Violence, Injury/Injury detail, and Medical content

Moderate: Child abuse

Minor: Domestic abuse, Drug use, Sexual violence, Child abuse, Confinement, Drug abuse, Terminal illness, Trafficking, Suicidal thoughts, Torture, and Child death