Hardcover, 496 pages
Published Sept. 12, 2022
Her city is under siege. The zombies are coming back. And all Nona wants is a birthday party. In many ways, Nona is like other people. She lives with her family, has a job at her local school, and loves walks on the beach and meeting new dogs. But Nona's not like other people. Six months ago she woke up in a stranger's body, and she's afraid she might have to give it back. The whole city is falling to pieces. A monstrous blue sphere hangs on the horizon, ready to tear the planet apart. Blood of Eden forces have surrounded the last Cohort facility and wait for the Emperor Undying to come calling. Their leaders want Nona to be the weapon that will save them from the Nine Houses. Nona would prefer to live an ordinary life with the people she loves, with Pyrrha and Camilla and Palamedes, but …
Her city is under siege. The zombies are coming back. And all Nona wants is a birthday party. In many ways, Nona is like other people. She lives with her family, has a job at her local school, and loves walks on the beach and meeting new dogs. But Nona's not like other people. Six months ago she woke up in a stranger's body, and she's afraid she might have to give it back. The whole city is falling to pieces. A monstrous blue sphere hangs on the horizon, ready to tear the planet apart. Blood of Eden forces have surrounded the last Cohort facility and wait for the Emperor Undying to come calling. Their leaders want Nona to be the weapon that will save them from the Nine Houses. Nona would prefer to live an ordinary life with the people she loves, with Pyrrha and Camilla and Palamedes, but she also knows that nothing lasts forever. And each night, Nona dreams of a woman with a skull-painted face...
Great book bit I understood nothing.
Third book, third voice, everyone has a new damn name and the dog has too many legs.
I’m probably gonna reread and maybe understand more of the ride I was on.
4/5
Ahh Nona. So naive and child like, so curious and loving and yet also slightly annoying at how little she understands. She was a very different character compared to Gideon and Harrow, essentially their opposites. It was a fresh take on the world to see everything in such a light and it made it a lot easier to follow.
Once again though we go through the story with the perspective of someone who had very little understanding of what is happening and it leaves it all up to the reader to figure out. I enjoyed the puzzle though, there were enough clues to figure out quite a bit. Though I still have many questions, so hopefully the next book will wrap things up well.
Overall it felt like a very long setup for a grand finale. I’m not sure it was all necessary, but it was a good book …
4/5
Ahh Nona. So naive and child like, so curious and loving and yet also slightly annoying at how little she understands. She was a very different character compared to Gideon and Harrow, essentially their opposites. It was a fresh take on the world to see everything in such a light and it made it a lot easier to follow.
Once again though we go through the story with the perspective of someone who had very little understanding of what is happening and it leaves it all up to the reader to figure out. I enjoyed the puzzle though, there were enough clues to figure out quite a bit. Though I still have many questions, so hopefully the next book will wrap things up well.
Overall it felt like a very long setup for a grand finale. I’m not sure it was all necessary, but it was a good book regardless.
Charming bits, but the framing of the same character losing their memory at the start of each book(or at least kinda...it's complicated) lost a bit of it's luster this time around.
that's probably due to that fact that it's been so long that I listened to the first books and also that english is not my first language. The first part with the kids was kinda boring for looooong stretched especially comparing to the first to books, things picked up in the end but as I said I had no idea what was going on anymore.
But Hotsauce is cool ^__^
I love this book so much. This series really benefits from having read the whole thing in a row, and this is the first time I've read it like this. This story is so much about love and how we love those around us, specifically this book is about the love between a found family and how important it is to care for those around us especially in tough times. The story is so touching, and Muir balances it perfectly with her brand of humor. I was laughing through my tears. "Life is too short and love is too long" "You can't take loved away"
In book 1 you fall in love with Gideon, and in book 2 Gideon is gone. Even deleted from memory. Eventually you fall in love with Harrow, so guess how much Harrow we get in book 3! Once again it's less than none. Is this a pattern? Is this series with non-stop death and skeletons possibly meant to make me think about loss?
Other than Gideon and Harrow, what else was good in the first two books? I guess skeletons, magic, and spaceships were cool. So those are also deleted. Thinking about loss yet?! Hope you like going to school in the projects! Just in case you thought that could be fun, let's delete your capacity to read and write and think complex thoughts. Perfect!
This violent approach to destroying everything the reader loves sounds funny, but it's a huge risk too. It only works if you can again invent …
In book 1 you fall in love with Gideon, and in book 2 Gideon is gone. Even deleted from memory. Eventually you fall in love with Harrow, so guess how much Harrow we get in book 3! Once again it's less than none. Is this a pattern? Is this series with non-stop death and skeletons possibly meant to make me think about loss?
Other than Gideon and Harrow, what else was good in the first two books? I guess skeletons, magic, and spaceships were cool. So those are also deleted. Thinking about loss yet?! Hope you like going to school in the projects! Just in case you thought that could be fun, let's delete your capacity to read and write and think complex thoughts. Perfect!
This violent approach to destroying everything the reader loves sounds funny, but it's a huge risk too. It only works if you can again invent a character to fall in love with and a great setting for them. Yep, that happens again. Nona is awesome.
The book is a bit of a slow start. Nothing happens in the first half. (You liked plot? No plot for you!) But Nona & friends are an interesting bunch, so even their everyday lives are pretty cool. The broken-down environment with some magic that nobody cares about and a huge monster looming above the city... Is this [b:Borne|31451186|Borne (Borne, #1)|Jeff VanderMeer|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1477487850l/31451186.SX50.jpg|48253660]? The dream sequences start out incomprehensible, but become a pretty exciting infodump very fast.
In all three books the ending was so quick and complex that I forgot them right away. I just finished book 3 and I couldn't tell you what happened beyond that they got to the Locked Tomb. The rest is a dream-like blur. I wonder if this is intended or I just didn't pay enough attention. Anyway, I can't wait for book 4! I hope it comes out this year.
Also on the topic of loss: Gideon is back. She's still talking smack and is kind of funny. But we see her through Nona's eyes now and all the charm is gone. The Gideon we loved is dead! It's her corpse walking. Fantastic work on that. But I'm still rooting for a true resurrection! All I want for book 4 is to just take the 3 characters we love, and put them on stage together! (Nona can be Alecto.)
Nona, the new Ninth character is different and very amusing. The setting is a planet with "regular" humans, and there is more backstory filled in on John/God and the general shape of the Locked Tomb universe.
April 11th, 2022 (2nd read)
first half was my favorite! (going through a character's life with all their opinions overlayed is my bread and butter lol)
second half was confusing but very interesting. I keep thinking about the concept of a "perfect Lyctorhood" and it gives me a headache in the best possible way
Content warning Thoughts on Nona the Ninth, spoilers for the Locked Tomb series
I think my final opinion of Nona the Ninth is extremely biased by finding out at the end that it wasn't the end of the trilogy as expected. About halfway through, I was still kinda just enjoying the ride, watching some pieces of info come together, picking up some additional background. I wasn't super into Nona as a character, but whatever. Then I got to the end, and the Big Twist, and suddenly the entire book felt like a waste.
I thoroughly enjoyed both the Gideon and Harrow books. I appreciated how Harrow was just batshit insane and a very unreliable narrator in her book, and how different it was from the first. It was a pretty chaotic ride. I think if Nona had actually wrapped up the storyline, it would have made the meandering and needless code naming of prior characters worth it. Instead, it was just very unsatisfying to me. It felt like filler.
Thoughts on Nona the Ninth, spoilers for the Locked Tomb series
I do still very much enjoy Tamsyn Muir's writing style. I would not call this a "bad" book. As I said, I am likely biased because I expected this book to wrap up the trilogy. All the same, I will likely not read the next book until there are plenty of reviews out so I can find out if there will be yet another bait and switch.
Harrowhark Nonagesimus is still one of the best names I've read anywhere.
It shouldn't be possible, after reading Gideon the Ninth and Harrow the Ninth, to finish another Locked Tomb novel and yet again be like "What the hell did I just read?!" However.
Nona the Ninth is yet another wonderful, unexpected, weird masterpiece from Tamsyn Muir.
Did this feel like a bit of a filler at times? Yes. Is having an extra book that accomplishes less than the previous two, in terms of resolving existing plotlines, immensely preferable to having a rushed final volume in a series, especially if said book is full of delightful character moments? Also yes.
In the words of wise tumblr user gideonisms: "tlt was written for the girls who get obsessed with random side characters and for everyone who did the lord’s work in the early 2010s: shipping two women who have spoken twice in canon."
The first 160 pages could have been way shorter. Although I like the story, it bothers me a lot that it feels like "Lost", where there is a lot of confusion for the sake of confusion IMO. That doesn't make it an interesting book, but kind of bothering. I like Nona as a character though, probably the most likely character in the whole series.
Very confusing. That nothing from the previous books was explained made it even more confusing; i forgot much of the details that were apparently required to know. I mean, i like it when a book in a series doesn't explain every little detail, but a short sentence here and there to jog the memory would have been nice.
It was still pretty good, after a slow start, but i don't like the style. Too confusing.
Nona impressions seem to be inevitably colored by the fact that the novel originated from what was planned to be Alecto's first act, so I can understand people calling it a "setup book" or just a way to move the 5-dimensional chess pieces to where Muir needs them to be so Alecto can begin, but I feel that's unfair. This is a great novel that makes Nona a fully realized character, provides a sense of place and setting unlike any other in the series, manages to juggle between a good number of factions and also trumps both Gideon and Harrow in the emotional department, thanks to (particularly) Nona's found family unit and the kids she befriends.
I honestly came away from it with less questions than I expected, and all the ones I can think of feel more like intentional blanks than stuff I'd find answers for in a reread, …
Nona impressions seem to be inevitably colored by the fact that the novel originated from what was planned to be Alecto's first act, so I can understand people calling it a "setup book" or just a way to move the 5-dimensional chess pieces to where Muir needs them to be so Alecto can begin, but I feel that's unfair. This is a great novel that makes Nona a fully realized character, provides a sense of place and setting unlike any other in the series, manages to juggle between a good number of factions and also trumps both Gideon and Harrow in the emotional department, thanks to (particularly) Nona's found family unit and the kids she befriends.
I honestly came away from it with less questions than I expected, and all the ones I can think of feel more like intentional blanks than stuff I'd find answers for in a reread, which I appreciate. Can't wait for Alecto!
