So far three books has been published in this series Gideon, Harrow and Nona the ninth and we are awaiting Alecto the ninth that is supposed to end the series. I'm mostly going to write about the first two partially to avoid spoilers but mostly because the books get weirder as you go and I don't think i can explain Nona in a way that makes sense.
Gideon the ninth
Ten thousand years from now humanity is spread out into space divided into and controlled by the nine necromantic houses. Sort of, the first house is mostly the emperor and god and his immortal lyctoral saints and the ninth house is a dying cult desperately trying to keep up appearances.
There's also a war happening but its not relevant to the plot and so its not explained, as in after three books I'm still not entirely sure who they are fighting. this book takes an unusual approach to exposition as in there are none figure it out from context.
Anyhow several of the lyctors have died and in order to fill out the ranks the emperor has called on the nine houses to each send a necromancer and their cavalier (swordfighter) to become new lyctors. the ninth house sending the Reverant daughter Harrowhark Nonagesimus (this is not the weirdest name in this series) and her cavalier Gideon Nav. They are chosen because they are literally the only people in the ninth house below retirement age. They arrive at the mostly empty planet and the research facility there the past lyctors worked were given access to their labs and told to figure it out.
Then one by one the other chevaliers and necromancers are found dead.
Harrow the ninth
After the events of the first book Harrow isn't doing too well. She is a lyctor living with the emperor on his space station and being taught by the older lyctors. But her powers doesn't work the way they should and she keeps having flashbacks to the events of the first book. Except the flashbacks doesn't show the events as they happened. Most notable Gideon isn't there and having been replaced by Ortus as Harrows cavalier.
Don't remember Ortus? He died off screen in the beginning of the first book while harrow and Gideon were fighting.
To make matters worse Ortus is trying to kill her. Not flashback Ortus, there's a lyctor that's also named Ortus. Though the Emperor treats it all with exasperation so it's probably not too serious. Plot-wise we find out that there is something called resurrection beasts. These are mile long Lovecraftian horrors that they have spent the last 10 000 years fighting. The reason new lyctors were needed was that the others had all died fighting them and now one is approaching.
Also the Emperor undying and Necrolord prime is a nice if weird man named Jon and Harrow can't wrap her head around her god being a person.
What do I think
Do I like it? I don't know, I mostly spend most of the book trying to figure out what is even happening.
Will I read the next one? Definitely, these are the most unique books I've read in a long time and I plan on rereading them, hopefully by then I'll understand something.
An interesting part of Harrow the ninth is Jon and his remaining three lyctors. It explores the long term effect of immortality. They are all somewhat disconnected from time, they speak of things that happened thousands of years ago as if it happened last week and keep rehashing the same arguments again and again.
It's a very good and interesting series, I like both Gideon and Harrow as characters and I would recommend it to anyone who likes fantasy. But it's not an easy series, you can't just sit back and relax. You need to actually pay attention if you want to figure it out.
If you have read it what did you think? Leave a comment. If you haven't read it you can check it out here Locked Tomb.
