Reviews with content warning for Murder - Ninth House

wanted to do a quick reread before finally reading hell bent. imo, of the recently released dark academia novels, this is one of the best. bardugo creates an interesting world with a compelling plot. i also think the way the plot & the intricacies of the novel unfold comes across very naturally, just the right amount of letting people be confused before slowly unveiling the mysteries & magic system etc.

none of the characters in her stories have held up to the cast of six of crows, but that is a high (and gay) bar to meet, so it's understandable.

this book discusses sexual assault/rape. it is not described in graphic detail, but it is briefly described and comes up multiple times throughout the novel, so i would keep that in mind if the topic is a trigger.

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bskalka's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious sad tense slow-paced

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

3.5

Maybe spoilers??

I enjoyed this book, however my main issue is the Darlington disappearance. To me, that seemed more important than the Tara murder, but by the end of the book they hadn't gotten him back and oh if you do want to see him come back read the next book. Like no I wanted to see him again in this book. It just felt like it kind of got lost in the other mystery and Leigh Bardugo went oops i forgot to write the end to this one so you will have to wait to find out if he's ok.

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kmoska's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging mysterious tense slow-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

4.0

Secret Societies revolving around mystery and murder, yes this had everything I would normally love. However, I had a hard time placing myself on the campus and in the buildings. The Author could have incorporated a bit more world building. Obviously, I have never been to that campus so help me get there mentally. I enjoyed each character's personal mystery that we got to unravel as the plot progressed. I also enjoyed the stories main mystery so much I even read the next book. However, the book was so hard for me to get into mentally I had to buy the Audible of the story to really engrose myself in it and speed up the audio to enjoy it. I usually prefer reading a book cover to cover so that tells me it was just moving a bit to slow for me.

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jamesfitz3's review against another edition

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4.0

It takes a while to really get going. The first time I read this I got stuck in the first quarter and didn’t finish. But once you get past that first bit it’s really good

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