I had reservations about [b:Gideon the Ninth|42036538|Gideon the Ninth (The Locked Tomb, #1)|Tamsyn Muir|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1546870952l/42036538._SY75_.jpg|60943229]. The prose and dialogue were razor-sharp but I felt a distinct lack of something. In retrospect, its only failing was not being the book that I wanted it to be.

Harrow the Ninth blew away all of my reservations. There is nothing left of them but bone ash. Regardless of what I wanted, this book was so powerfully itself that my curmudgeonly self could not survive the onslaught. Cue The Monkees:

Then I saw her [skull-painted] face, now I'm a believer
Not a trace of doubt in my [blown] mind

The hype is real, sheeple! And it's no longer just lesbian necromancers in space. Now it's bisexual necromancer gods in space!

I started this second book in the trilogy with cynical caution, not helped at all by the second-person narration which at first felt like an extra layer of thickness laid over the already thick prose (and if you find yourself being turned off by this, my advice: DON'T BE, JUST DON'T,) but it drew me in progressively throughout its five acts. This is a fantastical mystery, punctuated by gut-strewing action. You will of course remember the end events of [b:Gideon the Ninth|42036538|Gideon the Ninth (The Locked Tomb, #1)|Tamsyn Muir|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1546870952l/42036538._SY75_.jpg|60943229]. It becomes obvious very quickly in Harrow the Ninth that something is very different. The what of the mystery is rapidly deduced, at least in broad strokes. You will have to keep reading for the why, the how and the who, and then comes the OMG (literally) and the JFC and this one soup scene and the BOOM!

Muir's prose is as sharp and inventive and poetic as ever. I imagine that she came across several years' worth of word-of-the-day calendars at a yard sale, probably from 1998, 2002, 2003, and 2007-09 along with an anatomy textbook and decided to put them all to good use. My dictionary search history while reading this book includes the following, often to verify that they were real words:

-slumbrous
-lubricious
-pellucid
-tergiversation
-florescent
-cinereous
-parodos and epiparodos

and one earned application of poetic license with flecks of gray-madder in someone's irises.

One word irked me: nacreous, because it appeared with excessive regularity. I counted four instances in the first 100 pages, and I think six in total. It specified the shade of the robes that lyctors wore most of the time, continuing well after it was firmly established that this was the colour of the robes. At one point it switched to simply mother-of-pearl then alternated back and forth, causing me much irritation.

HERE'S THE GREAT NEWS: Occasional irritation at word choice is the only bad thing I can say about this book! Under most circumstances I would be generally annoyed by the characters; every one of them extremely disagreeable, hating everyone else, sharp-tongued and flawless at repartee. At best, I could like them, even like them a hell of a lot, without caring a damn for any of them. Muir made me care. Well, kind of.

I am convinced: [a:Tamsyn Muir|6876324|Tamsyn Muir|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1543423040p2/6876324.jpg] is a flagship author of a new generation (one newer than my own, certainly).

Love the book design too.
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See my review for [b:Gideon the Ninth|42036538|Gideon the Ninth (The Locked Tomb, #1)|Tamsyn Muir|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1546870952l/42036538._SY75_.jpg|60943229]: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/3064194121?book_show_action=false&from_review_page=1