Gideon the Ninth (The Locked Tomb #1) by Tamsyn Muir

The first of the Hugo nominated novels I read “on purpose”.

The book tells about a future world which has divided into nine “houses”, each ruling a planet. All houses practice a sort of necromancy which is able to raise skeletons, which are often used for menial tasks. Gideon Nav has lived at the Ninth House (which for some fairly poorly defined reason has a very bad reputation). She is trying to escape as she feels, and is not entirely incorrect, that she has been treated badly. The heir of the house, Harrowhark, prevents her escape. She asks Gideon to become her cavalier when she goes to a trial to become a “Lyctor”, which are apparently extremely powerful necromancers who help the emperor. Together they travel to the old mansion at the planet ruled by the First House. There they meet other heirs and cavaliers sent by other houses. They are supposed to explore the mansion – there aren’t really any other competition rules stated beforehand to find who will be the new Lyctor. The mansion contains strange and valuable secrets. Soon many of the heirs and cavaliers end up dead. Is someone murdering them? The survivors form alliances and try at the same time to solve the puzzles together and to beat the competition.

The book is told from the viewpoint of Gideon. She is a very snarky, often ironic character who comments on things, sometimes aloud, sometimes only in her mind. The world itself is interesting, but there is practically no exposition at all, and at the end of the book I was still more than a bit baffled who makes things work, and especially why things work as they work. Enough – or almost enough – is revealed to somehow understand why things are happening. How they are happening, and what the actual structure and social system of the world is, is left largely open – or I was too stupid to understand it. Overall a very good book, but a little bit more exposition might have made it easier and more enjoyable to read.


437 pp.