Reviews with content warning for Drug use - Nona la nona

'This is all there is to love? Simply by being in your life, I have added indelibly to its weight?'

Thoughts I wrote in my notes when reading this book: This book is controlling my life, and I love it. All I want to do is burrow into the sofa and absorb into it. I already know that after finishing, I’ll want to start again like I’m reading it for the first time.

So yeah, I loved this book. I’ve loved all of the Locked Tomb series, and Nona the Ninth is the completely unexpected, wonderful addition we didn’t know we needed. Tamsyn Muir has such a sharp, gorgeous way of writing, and you’re immediately drawn into the narrative and invested in the story. The concept behind these books is so original, fresh, and exciting. I can’t stop talking about it.

After the two previous books, Gideon the Ninth and 2021’s Harrow the Ninth, you would naturally expect a third and final book to round out what we thought would be a trilogy. But then Muir throws in Nona like a delightful little spanner in the works, and suddenly you realise how necessary and just how delightful and funny and dark and sad and bittersweet this interlude is. It allows us to focus on characters we hadn’t seen in Harrow the Ninth, gives context to and humanises Blood of Eden and the other side of this conflict, and provides us with God’s villainous origin story.

Although I was a little lost at times, especially figuring out where Harrow ends and Nona starts, I didn’t really mind. Muir doesn’t pander to the reader with lots of exposition - she trusts you to figure it out. It's the sort of writing that I love, where sometimes you have no idea what's going on, but you don’t mind because you’re so swept up in the story and characters. Even when I put the book down, I still kept on thinking about it and tugging on the threads of the storytelling that are kept dangling for us.

This book is gorgeous and delightful and funny and so so sad. You will love Nona to pieces, and Palamedes and Camilla and all of the other characters that Nona adores so much. It's just an absolutely bat-shit crazy book, and I can’t express my love for it enough. It’s wild, surprising, heart-wrenching and very very special.

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kylieqrada's review against another edition

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adventurous dark 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

Tamsyn Muir is undoubtedly some sort of supergenius mastermind and I bow down to her. Despite the fact that I had to consult the wiki every few chapters and reread fairly often, I LOVED this book. I have no idea where we are going, but I am enjoying the ride!!

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angstifies's review against another edition

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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

a lot of messy shit happened in this book but the thing that threw me off the most is, with no doubt, ianthe and gideon being friends. still can’t fathom it.

i love this series so much and this book was such an incredible addiction; i loved the new setting, the newly introduced characters, and how the story is progressing. now i will not know peace until i own a copy of book 4.

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ehmannky's review against another edition

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dark emotional funny reflective medium-paced

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

5.0

"You can't take loved away."

This sentence just floored me. I love all of The Locked Tomb series, but Nona is where I feel like we're really starting to see the themes of what forgiveness is, the way imperialism cannibalizes identity, what does it mean to heal in an unclean way, the emptiness of revenge, the uselessness of punishment as justice, and the power of love to (in the book's case literally!) turn you into someone else. And it's just so lovely. And it's just fantastically written. It's amazing how Muir can swing the wild tonal shifts of each book, but they all work so well together and give each protagonist such a unique voice.

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theirgracegrace's review against another edition

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funny reflective tense medium-paced

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

4.75

Nona the Ninth, Tamsyn Muir's third book of four in the Locked Tomb series, is a sudden but welcome shift from the previous two books. Nona is just a nineteen year old relearning how to interact with society with the help of her three parental figures. But it is later discovered that

the three parents are necromancers from the Nine Houses and that Nona herself is piloting the body of someone named Harrowhark Nonagesimus, and the Nine Houses want them back

. An astounding dual point-of-view familiar to readers of Harrow the Ninth and a cast of loveable characters familiar of the same. The explosive ending leaves me wanting more!

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