FORMAT: PAPERBACK (REVIEWED), DIGITAL | RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW

Tamsyn Muir’s Gideon the Ninth was a smash hit; it’s blend of strong humour, decidedly queer heroes, necromancy, space opera and an extremely unreliable narrator was a blast of fresh air for many science fiction and fantasy fans. It was also going to be a tough act to follow so we keenly anticipated the sequel, Harrow The Ninth.

Part of the problem with a sequel was that the previous book ended in a gloriously messy way. The character of Gideon is meant to be, quite frankly, a total nightmare and the first book felt in places like Absolutely Fabulous. But in space. With lesbians. Who are necromancers. With explosions. How exactly does one follow that?

Well the answer turns out to be ‘very well, thank you’, and yes, we are going to avoid spoilers here so please bear with us. Harrow The Ninth is broadly more of the same, but with much more world building and mythology. As the title suggests, this book is all about Harrow, Gideon’s lover from the first book. And without giving anything away, Harrow is in a lot of trouble and it’s mostly Gideon’s fault.

Harrow’s story is a one of confusion and disappointment. Not only has her world completely fallen apart, she’s also been exalted to a position that she simply cannot maintain. The powers she should be able to access are failing her and she’s beginning to lose her mind. Her mentors are ancient and she’s still very young, so the resultant dialogue is electric, filled with sarcasm and very funny.

This means that the pace of the novel is a little choppy; instead of space opera romp we get something of a pan-galactic high school drama, with absolutely loads of exposition throughout. Luckily Muir’s writing is always entertaining and the entire book is a lot of fun from beginning to end.

Harrow the Ninth is very much the middle book of a trilogy and yet Harrow manages to carry the story. If you loved the first book, this will keep you happy until the final part comes out next year.