A review by lindaskessler
Ninth House by Leigh Bardugo

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

3.5

“I want to survive this world that keeps trying to destroy me.” 

This is a dark academia featuring cultish magic and rituals, good ol’ boys clubs, and people (often women or POC) caught in the crosshairs. It’s twists and turns, some are alluded to more and others caught me by surprise. First in a trilogy 👀

“Mors irrumat omnia. Death fucks us all.”

Well this was a wildly different vibe than pretty much all my other reads this month! And a first for me as I’ve never really ventured into the dark academia genre before but this was a book club pick for my @citygirlswhowalkdc sci fi and fantasy book club 📚 

In movies, books, TV, and to some extent even in real life, when people lean too hard on a character being “bad,” not fitting in, or mysterious in a suspicious way I think a lot of people tend to go hm.. bet there’s more to this person than meets the eye and such was the case here. Her “issues” were harped on so much and everyone around her seemed to not give her much respect to the point I was just running a little Galaxy fan club in my head. Surely if everyone and everything is against her she’s our antihero, right?

I don’t want to give anything away, the mystery elements are a main driver of the plot of this story, but I will say I recommend this book for those who enjoy dark academia. 

Trigger warning, I will say that in my opinion (and seemingly that of many) the author was too detailed with the sexual assault scenes. There is a way to be more delicate with these topics. I understand those experiences being included, they happen in real life and can happen in stories too, but to me I was wondering why are we getting a moment to moment play by play of this. And I do think if the author had (imho) handled those scenes with more care I would have given this book a higher rating.
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