A review by mitskacir
Gideon the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir

5.0

This book was a romp, and ticked off all the things I could want in a novel: lesbians, spoopy aesthetic, a genius mash up of gothic, sci-fi, fantasy, and mystery genres, action scenes but also a lot of nerds talking about magic/science, and some straight-up-my-alley irreverent deadpan humor. Imagine reading Nancy Drew, but there are a lot more swords, everyone is seriously dedicated to spooky makeup and has magical skeleton powers, everyone has the hots for each other, and most of the characters are dead or will be soon. Nearly every character had a great hidden secret, and I couldn't help imagining each reveal as a Scooby Doo monster de-masking. There were definitely some plot holes (some of which could be addressed in book 2), and the sheer number of characters and unexplained magic rules got pretty confusing, but this was so unique and fun I set those flaws aside.