Ninth House by Leigh Bardugo—Book Review

Ninth House by Leigh Bardugo
Book Review

synopsis (from the official Leigh Bardugo website):

“The best fantasy novel I’ve read in years, because it’s about real people. Bardugo’s imaginative reach is brilliant, and this story―full of shocks and twists―is impossible to put down.” – Stephen King

Galaxy “Alex” Stern is the most unlikely member of Yale’s freshman class. Raised in the Los Angeles hinterlands by a hippie mom, Alex dropped out of school early and into a world of shady drug dealer boyfriends, dead-end jobs, and much, much worse. By age twenty, in fact, she is the sole survivor of a horrific, unsolved multiple homicide. Some might say she’s thrown her life away. But at her hospital bed, Alex is offered a second chance: to attend one of the world’s most elite universities on a full ride. What’s the catch, and why her?

Still searching for answers to this herself, Alex arrives in New Haven tasked by her mysterious benefactors with monitoring the activities of Yale’s secret societies. These eight windowless “tombs” are well-known to be haunts of the future rich and powerful, from high-ranking politicos to Wall Street and Hollywood’s biggest players. But their occult activities are revealed to be more sinister and more extraordinary than any paranoid imagination might conceive.

My thoughts:

The last 100 pages of this book was a roller-coaster and had me so shook.

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

While many say that the beginning was slow I found it to be perfect since Bardugo had to set up world building and and introduce characters and develop backstories. Do everything that involves creating a new world that intertwines with ours but is not so outlandish that we couldn’t believe it. Did I have to forgo some sense of disbelief, yes, but not by much.

The book follows our main character Galaxy “Alex” Stern—and honestly if a badass name like “Galaxy Stern” doesn’t make you want to pick up this book then I don’t know what will. Alex is a high school dropout, drug addict, ghost seer and that is dragged into the world of Yale. Yale, with its rich frat boys, playing with old dark and powerful magic that they will never understand. After a near-death experience Alex is offered a deal with the ninth secret house of “The House of Veil” that resides on the campus of Yale University. She attends college there to blend in but is but her main purpose is to oversee the use of ritual magic throughout the year, to make sure no ghost get lose during the rites.

But this is only the beginning of the story. The magic that Ninth House holds is dark, gritty, full of potential that far beyond the capabilities of its rich young and dumb power-hunger users can barely understand.

Everyone has a secret in the book and no one tells the truth. Bardugo wrote a plot that is never dull, predictable, or over showy. She also never attempts to make us love Alex, a girl who been through hell and back and has a knack for getting into trouble. She never tries to beautify Alex or her anger or actions. Alex is a bad person and a very unlikable one at that, but it is also what makes her so refreshing in a world where every is lying and trying forth a fake self to get ahead.

A user I follow on Goodreads describe Alex perfectly in her review: “[. . .] she is as magical as she is ragged, as resigned as she is determined, as accepting of the ghost she sees as she is lacking understanding of the true nastiness of the magic she is charged with keeping.”

In the beginning, all of the pieces that are introduced seem unconnected and you start to wonder where Bardugo was going with this. It is confusing and seemingly unrelated sub-plots all mixed in with blurry haze of drugs fulled on magic, and an a convoluted and twisted reality forms the overall plot—and in the center of it all is Galaxy Stern.

I cannot recommend this book enough. Please be aware that it is for adults as it does deal with very heavy topics and adult content.

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Order Ninth House: Ninth House

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