Ninth House by Leigh Bardugo

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I am so mad at myself for taking so long to get around to this book. The hype surrounding this one was real, with good reason. When I heard what Ninth House was about, I had to snatch up a copy even though I've never actually read any of Leigh Bardugo's other books. It's basically the type of book you would write if you wanted to set a trap to catch me.

Secret societies and the occult? Seeing ghosts? Magic? Murder and some pretty disturbing rituals? A girl named Galaxy? COUNT ME IN. This one does need trigger warnings for murder, drug abuse and overdosing, rape (including rape of a child) and other sexual assault, racism, medical procedure descriptions, gore and other graphic descriptions. I know that sounds like a lot, but if none of those are triggers for you this book is an intensely wild ride.

In Ninth House, Galaxy (Alex) Stern has just begun at Yale. After surviving a traumatic and harrowing incident, she was offered a deal she couldn't refuse: free education at Yale in exchange for using her "gift" to monitor the secret societies on campus. But when she agreed, she had no idea what exactly it would be that she was policing.

I completely ate this book up. I was constantly torn between wanting to put it down to savor the experience and get to read it for a longer period of time and fly through it. I ended up giving in and flying through it. I loved seeing Alex grow and fight her own demons and really come into her own. I really enjoyed Darlington's character and would have loved getting more of him. I was fascinated learning about the different secret societies and their different types of magic. It's dark. It's heavy. It's twisted. But it's fascinating.

I honestly got a lot of City of Ghosts (Victoria Schwab-Cassidy Blake series) vibes from this one, but with a much more adult tone. 

Ninth House will also be developed as a TV series from Amazon, and Bardugo has also said there will be a sequel, so I'm super excited to get more Alex Stern content!

Overall Rating: 5 out of 5 Stars

The Wayward Children Series by Seanan McGuire

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Just looking at the covers of these books immediately drew me in. But the stories themselves were so worth staying for. The Wayward Children series of novellas by Seanan McGuire has four books so far: Every Heart a Doorway, Down Among the Sticks and Bones, Beneath the Sugar Sky, and In An Absent Dream. I tried to avoid spoilers, but as always, in describing multiple books in a series it is sometimes inevitable.

Cover Art Courtesy of Goodreads

In Every Heart a Doorway, we are introduced to Eleanor West's Home for Wayward Children. This is a school for children who have mysteriously disappeared to another world, only to return later and be deemed insane for their stories and desires to return to those worlds. Think falling down a rabbit hole or climbing through a dresser. Each world is the type of world the child is meant to be in, whether that is Nonsense or Logic based, Virtuous or Wicked, and when they return to our world after emerging from their rabbit hole, dresser drawer, etc. all they want to do is go back to where they perfectly fit in. 

Cover Art Courtesy of Goodreads

This first story follows Nancy as she gets to know her schoolmates and longs to return to her world, The Halls of the Dead. But when people start turning up dead at the school, the children have to fight to solve the mystery.

Down Among the Sticks and Bones follows twins Jack and Jill, who were prominent characters in the first book. This is almost a prequel of sorts, as the story follows the twins when they first find their world, The Moors. This one was definitely creepy and very dark, as The Moors is a very horror movie-esque world. I think this is my favorite out of the books so far.


Beneath the Sugar Sky takes place in a Nonsense world, Confection, that's basically a huge Candy Land board. This story centers around Rini, Sumi's (a character from the first book) daughter. Rini is on a mission to turn back time and save her land from the Queen of Cakes and enlists the help of the children at Eleanor's. This was my least favorite of the four, but that's really not saying much because I still really enjoyed it! We are introduced to some new characters and worlds in this book as well.

Cover Art Courtesy of Goodreads

In An Absent Dream also seemingly functions as a prequel, telling Miss Lundy's story from when she was a child, back in the Goblin Market, and what led her to her strange condition today. I was getting serious Labyrinth vibes from this one!

I am so in love with this series. It has the perfect mix of fantasy and realism. The plots are full of adventure or mystery. The asexual, pansexual, and trans representation in these stories is out of this world. The writing is lyrically beautiful and immersive. I've seen this compared to Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children, but this series is so much more than that. 

These book covers are probably the most beautiful I have ever seen, and each is actually incredibly short, making it a series that is easy to binge-read over and over again! It looks like another book in the Wayward Children series, Come Tumbling Down, is set for release in 2020, and I cannot wait to get my hands on it.

Every Heart a Doorway Rating: 5 out of 5 Stars

Down Among the Sticks and Bones Rating: 5 out of 5 Stars

Beneath the Sugar Sky Rating: 5 out of 5 Stars

In An Absent Dream Rating: 5 out of 5 Stars

Overall Series Rating: 5 out of 5 Stars

Dreadful Young Ladies and Other Stories by Kelly Barnhill

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Short stories about the creepy and the unusual...count me in! If it's eerie and weird it's usually right up my alley, so I couldn't wait to dive into this collection of short stories. Dreadful Young Ladies and Other Stories by Kelly Barnhill features a collection of 5 magical tales that aim to set the reader on a journey of weirdness and wonder.

This book ended up being very middle of the road for me, with a mixed bag of stories that I either really liked or didn't enjoy at all. It was a quick read and I breezed through it in a couple of hours. While some stories I really enjoyed (I'm looking at you "Mrs. Sorensen and the Sasquatch' and "Dreadful Young Ladies"), others left something to be desired ("The Insect and the Astronomer" and "Open the Door and the Light Pours Through"). The novella at the end, "The Unlicensed Magician," has won the World Fantasy Award, and I can see why...it was well thought out, contained just enough to tell a full story, and was completely fascinating! I also have to note that the cover is absolutely stunning.

This was my first experience with Kelly Barnhill's works, and I've heard that The Girl Who Drank the Moon is quite good, so I may pick that up and give it a try even though it's a middle grade novel. I thought there was a lot of potential in this collection of stories, but something was missing overall that just might be there in a novel-length work.

Since there were 5 stories and I enjoyed 3 of them, this rating may very well be the easiest one I've ever done!

Overall Rating: 3 out of 5 Stars

Thank you to Algonquin Books for sending me a copy of this short story collection to review! Dreadful Young Ladies and Other Stories releases on February 20, so if this sounds up your alley make sure to pick up a copy!