Ninth House (2019)
Written by: Leigh Bardugo
Genre: Urban Fantasy/Horror
Pages: 480 (Hardcover)
Publisher: Flatiron Books
Why I Chose It: Because it’s been on my radar for some months now, after reading a sample somewhere on the web. Because I love secret magical societies in university settings. Because the premise was compelling. Because the cover was slinky and pretty.
The Premise:
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. In fact, by age twenty, 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 prestigious universities on a full ride. What’s the catch, and why her?
Still searching for answers, Alex arrives in New Haven tasked by her mysterious benefactors with monitoring the activities of Yale’s secret societies. Their eight windowless “tombs” are the well-known haunts of the rich and powerful, from high-ranking politicos to Wall Street’s biggest players. But their occult activities are more sinister and more extraordinary than any paranoid imagination might conceive. They tamper with forbidden magic. They raise the dead. And, sometimes, they prey on the living.
Spoilers below, though I have marked the paragraph.
Discussion: I’ll admit, I nearly bounced off of this one at the start because the herky-jerky time frame made it hard to get my bearings. Also, I realized I was a lot less interested in secret societies when they involved Yale. But I pressed on because the character of Alex Stern is compelling.
I am a sucker for heroines who are not nice. Alex is the very definition of “not nice.” She has a deeply screwed up past and a flexible, violent moral center. She lies and maneuvers any way she needs to in order to get her tasks accomplished, no regrets. And, despite all that, she has a rigid sense of justice.
I love that combination.
Alex has been plucked out of a hospital ward after surviving a massacre of her friends. She’s given a new purpose: come to Yale and take up the mantel of the magical Lethe Society’s “Shepherd,” a position that is supposed to keep the other eight magical societies in line. I loved watching Alex journey from pure self-interested survivor to being that hero who will endanger herself to protect others. I also thought that Bardugo did an excellent job of showing that those protective seeds were always a part of Alex, so it’s not a character heel-turn so much as Alex’s decision to let that scrap of her personality blossom.
When she was living rough, she tried to protect her friend Helena, and failed. When she is sent to make sure that a corpse of another young woman has nothing to link her to any of the eight magical societies that pepper the Yale campus, Alex finds herself unable to take the easy answer that multiple people try to give her.
Like a noir hero, Alex has to keep pushing and poking and prying at all the seams of her new life, even if it’s making a terrible mess and exposing all the grimness beneath. Even if she hates what she’s uncovering.
There is a lot of noir in this book. Betrayals abound. Dark secrets are uncovered. Loss is a constant companion. And all of that magic is always bent toward manipulative ends. I really loved having a noir heroine. It’s a common mode for male heroes, but for a young, female college student on a magical campus? The whole book felt really fresh and sharp.
My usual pet peeves about noir do occur: there are a few too many twists. Sometimes I hate those twists because they start to strain plausibility. But here, my peeve was that there were so many that by the time I got to the primary twist/betrayal, I was kind of tapped out emotionally. That made the reveal more aggravating than awesome.
And frankly, that reveal deserved to be awesome. The final murder mystery twist is a perfect culmination of the worldbuilding and characterization that Bardugo has laid out. But it felt a little polluted by all the shenanigans that came fast and furious in the pages before.
SPOILERS below!
I also had intensely mixed feelings about the epilogue. In the very early pages of the book, Alex’s mentor and potential friend, Darlington, has an “incident” and vanishes. As the book progresses, we find out more about what happened to him. The epilogue centers on a new plan to get him back, but does so in a way that brings in an entirely different set of magical rules that felt shallow compared to the rest of the worldbuilding.
So I’m torn. On the one hand, yes, absolutely, rescue Darlington! I’d like to get to know him better! On the other, I didn’t like the shift in magic. The novel has been intensely non-religious throughout: the divide is between the living and the dead; the magic is based on geography as much as anything else. So to suddenly shift toward a religious concept? I wasn’t sold. Willing to be, but not quite there.
END SPOILERS
Overall, I really enjoyed this book once I pushed past the opening chapters. I love how Bardugo layers in two different understandings of the ghosts (Grays): The Yale societies’ view of how the Grays work, and Alex’s own life experience.
I think Bardugo’s writing is sharp and thoughtful in the details, which really help Alex spring to life.
When Alex meets with one of her teachers — the elegant Marguerite Belbalm — the scene is full of tiny little bits of sharp-edged commentary as Alex tries to mold herself to meet Belbalm’s approval both socially and as a student.
They are discussing the perfume that Belbalm is wearing here:
“Le Parfum de Therese,” Belbalm said. “Edmond Roudnitska. He was one of the great noses of the twentieth century and he designed this fragrance for his wife. Only she was allowed to wear it. Romantic, no?”
“Then — ”
“How do I come to wear it? Well, they both died and there was money to be made, so Frederic Malle put it on the market for us peasants to buy.”
Peasants was a word poor people didn’t use. Just like classy was a word that classy people didn’t use. But Belbalm smiled in a way that included Alex, so Alex smiled back in a way she hoped was just as knowing (p. 83).
There’s a lot to unpack in this simple exchange; from the tiny exclusivities that the upper class hold dear, to the way money is always a factor, to Bardugo’s use of language, and how this exchange is revelatory of both the characters.
I started off muddled about the various magics, but they take focus soon enough. True to the noir feel, these magical abilities are all about keeping power, wealth, and influence for the “right sort” of people, and the abilities feed off of the people least able to defend themselves. As the book begins, Alex is dismissive of the need for her role as shepherd. As the book ends, Alex knows her role is essential to keep the predators at bay. I will definitely be looking for the next book in the series.
In conclusion: I would recommend this book to any reader who likes dark fantasy. I will give you a content warning: there are several scenes of sexual assault in this book committed against Alex and against her friends. None of the scenes are overlong or gratuitously graphic.
This looks really good! I’ve added it to my wishlist!