Like the first novel in the series, this is an enormously frustrating read. I have read a lot of sci-fi over the years, including many of the series that are now regarded as classics in the sci-fi and fantasy realms. The frustration is because I strongly believe that the Locked Tomb series could easily be one of the greatest epic sci-fi series yet written. In terms of sheer invention, the complexity and sophistication of the world-building, the mastery of plot pacing, this ranks right up there. It has the galaxy-spanning quality but also the focus on intimate scenarios and fully realized localized situations that you get in someone like Iain Banks, for example.

But Muir can't resist the urge to show off for readers and is bewilderingly content to undercut so much of the amazing quality of her writing with shallow and inconsistent characterization. One big plus in this book is that Gideon, the annoying snot from the first novel, is largely absent. Unfortunately, not completely absent. And what makes Muir's work so frustrating for me is that she demonstrates that she can write amazing characters, people that you care about and who interact with one another in real and believable ways. In one of the many inventive twists and turns in this book she smartly figures out a way to bring back several of the characters from various Houses from the first novel, all of whom were more interesting than Harrow and Gideon, as well as smuggling in a couple of people that were marginal to the action in the first novel. And those sequences where we replay the events of Canaan house but in an alternate reality were well done and moving. She also continues to develop the Camilla/Palamedes relationship in ways that have an enormous pay-off in the third book. There is abundant evidence here that Muir has a highly developed sensibility for the pain and joy of being a full-fledged human.

Why oh why, then, are we subjected to characters like Gideon, Harrow, Ianthe and Mercymorn, all of whom speak as if they swallowed a collection of the worse Internet memes or, in the case of Ianthe and Mercymorn, as if they are refugees from some terrible 1920s novel about an English private school? Maybe Muir had a traumatic experience with private schools herself, in which case I sympathize, but those demons are perhaps best exorcised in private. Posturing is not evidence of charracter complexity, one-upping someone in a schoolyard slang contest is not character development, and threatening to punch someone in the butthole is not exactly deep-seated character conflict.

She builds out the world in fascinating ways, developing the vague references to "The River" from the first novel in fascinating ways, and creating raw and exciting action through the conflict with the Resurrection beasts. The world and history of the Saints is also fascinating (if you block your ears every time Mercymorn opens her mouth). There is a fierce, philosophical intelligence at work here. Unfortunately, it is itself in an all-out war with a sniggering twelve-year old boywho loves to use the word "boobies."

Fortunately, Muir finally seems to slap down that twelve-year old in the next book of the series, and in Nona, we finally get to see what Muir is capable of when she ditches dialog that sounds like it was lifted straight from any comments page on the Interwebs. ( )

The sequel to GIDEON THE NINTH gives more questions than it gives answers. It's a puzzle of a book where it takes to the very end to know what exactly is going on, but still don't have all the answers at the end! Looking forward to the conclusion! ( )

This book is divisive, and whether you like it seems to come down to how much you enjoy being confused. I love baffling but thoroughly thought out story structures, so I was into it.

Both camps, however, will love the part in the middle of the book where Harrow stops sleeping and learns to cook. I screamed. ( )

This was somehow even more nuts and more bewildering than Gideon. Loved

Beautifully insane, I can’t believe we have to wait for another installment.


This book is insane in all the right ways.I have to admit at first I was soooo confused I wasn't sure I was going to like Harrow as much as Gideon the Ninth. Harrow the Ninth is confusing, chaotic, & full of horror. Alas, the writing snares you and even when I was completely lost wondering how this could be a sequel, I had to keep going. You too may be put off to begin with, but once you see what is happening, you will be marveled by the genius of Tamsyn Muir. Do not be put off reading this, because you will be rewarded. ( )