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A review by dovedozen
Gideon the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir
adventurous
funny
mysterious
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.0
An extremely fun Dangan-Ronpa-esque murder mystery with a cast I enjoyed getting to know and FAR less lesbianism than folks online might have you believe. Come for the entertaining cadence and strong potential for worldbuilding, get through the first 80-some pages as fast as you can, and stay for the fascinating applications of the death- and body-horror-based magic system towards exciting crimes such as "killing people". And also, for the best character in the book, who is TRAGICALLY an unironic anime glasses man with TWO different close, compelling partnerships with women, god damn it all.
CONS: The first chunk is genuinely boring, the third-person-limited narration is a bit wasted on Gideon, whose inner monologue isn't as funny as Muir seems to think it is and whose emotional life is somehow largely impenetrable to the reader, the lesbian romance the text wants you to focus on feels inauthentic and underdeveloped while multiple less-relevant side romances between men and women manage to be compelling, race and gender are glossed over as concepts (but the fingerprints of the author's real-world relationship with them are visible all over the place), and the worldbuilding where it doesn't directly pertain to the magic system is often under-thought-out.
PROS: Aside from the Drearburh section the prose is SPARKLINGLY vivid and paced extremely well; aside from Gideon's stilted she-himbo routine it's fun to read and made me smile often. When the authentic character moments hit they really hit, and I was much fonder of most of the cast by the end of the book than I expected to be at first. The action scenes are exciting and entirely parse-able and I enjoyed the extent to which Muir committed to the visceral nature of the magic system. The mystery and the hints towards larger plot elements felt just right to me, and there is enough extra reference material included in the hardcover version I read that it's totally possible and kind of fun to retroactively make coherent sense of any names and terminology you didn't quite grasp by the end of the story. Also, Palamedes.
Overall it's great, the second book made it even better in retrospect, and I feel pretty comfortable expecting that the third will be a fantastic conclusion. Just don't go into it expecting anything better than the barest baseline of "some LGBT representation, I guess"--go in expecting bones.
CONS: The first chunk is genuinely boring, the third-person-limited narration is a bit wasted on Gideon, whose inner monologue isn't as funny as Muir seems to think it is and whose emotional life is somehow largely impenetrable to the reader, the lesbian romance the text wants you to focus on feels inauthentic and underdeveloped while multiple less-relevant side romances between men and women manage to be compelling, race and gender are glossed over as concepts (but the fingerprints of the author's real-world relationship with them are visible all over the place), and the worldbuilding where it doesn't directly pertain to the magic system is often under-thought-out.
PROS: Aside from the Drearburh section the prose is SPARKLINGLY vivid and paced extremely well; aside from Gideon's stilted she-himbo routine it's fun to read and made me smile often. When the authentic character moments hit they really hit, and I was much fonder of most of the cast by the end of the book than I expected to be at first. The action scenes are exciting and entirely parse-able and I enjoyed the extent to which Muir committed to the visceral nature of the magic system. The mystery and the hints towards larger plot elements felt just right to me, and there is enough extra reference material included in the hardcover version I read that it's totally possible and kind of fun to retroactively make coherent sense of any names and terminology you didn't quite grasp by the end of the story. Also, Palamedes.
Overall it's great, the second book made it even better in retrospect, and I feel pretty comfortable expecting that the third will be a fantastic conclusion. Just don't go into it expecting anything better than the barest baseline of "some LGBT representation, I guess"--go in expecting bones.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Gore and Body horror
Moderate: Chronic illness, Cancer, Fatphobia, Terminal illness, Death, Murder, Violence, and Toxic relationship
Minor: Child abuse, Child death, Death of parent, and Physical abuse