Imagine, if you will, a world in which you are familiar with all the people – except the ones with whom you aren’t, and new ones you haven’t met yet – and you have lost yourself and don’t know why these people or you are in this world, except that you are, and you like it, despite the complicating factors.

It is into this story that we are dropped at the beginning of Nona the Ninth, by Tamsyn Muir, the fourth book of a trilogy that began with Gideon the Ninth, and continued with Harrow the Ninth and will, (most probably) end with Alecto the Ninth next year.

Where Gideon put us in the middle of a fantasy/science-fiction action story and Harrow stuck us into the depths of a psychological horror tale, Nona feels very much like contemporary Urban Science Fiction, until the boots begin dropping.

The thing is, from the moment the book begins, you KNOW the boots are going to drop. You don’t know how many boots, how big they are or from how high they will drop, but they are hanging there in the sky as surely as Varun is. So when they begin to fall, it’s just a matter of waiting to see how many you anticipated correctly. ^_^ There’s a certain amount of purely fannish fun in trying to identify which boots – whose boots – you’re waiting for. When you get it right you feel VERY SMART. And then, sometimes, the story makes you feel not smart at all, so you sit there, waiting for the next boot.

Once again, Tamsyn Muir has populated a world with terrible people you really want to to hang out with. Really queer people who you just know would eat your for lunch and never notice, but you’d be so delighted to have had them be the ones to destroy you. ^_^

Ratings:

Overall – 10

The dog is fine. No need to worry about the dog. Everyone else, though…?