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A review by thesinginglights
The Ninth Rain by Jen Williams
5.0
4.75 stars, rounded up.
Everyone is sleeping on Jen Williams.
Great characterisation? Check.
Great worldbuilding? Check.
Eldritch beings with slight sci-fi slant? Double check.
This book is best experienced with as little primer as possible. Eldritch beings in a fantasy world is the pithy shorthand I will use. There are a lot of moving parts and Williams gives you morsels bit by bit. You don't understand what The Ninth Rain is until about a third of the way into the book. Alien creatures with an unknown intent, strange overgrown forest and wildlife, a once great civilisation dying with a whimper, an oppressive nunnery that imprisoners women for their magic.
And the three at the centre of it: an eccentric explorer, a vampire elf, and a pyrokinetic mage. There are two secondary perspectives as well but those are the main three.
Like her previous trilogy, The Copper Cat, she shows off her strength as an excellent character writer, able to draw out the distinctive voices of her cast and weave a story of intrigue and adventure. In general, it's a lot tighter than The Copper Cat. Williams has developed greatly as a writer to write intrigue but also in establishing setting and stakes. All three characters are distinctive and balanced excellently.
To be honest, there isn't much that isn't shining praise. There is so much to chew on about identity and purpose, love and loss, the ghosts of the past and the things we turn our attention, the things that drive us forward. It has trains in it too! Magically powered! Williams' prose is breezy and uncomplicated with a subtle hand for description with some gorgeous turns of phrase.
By and large my biggest criticism is that some details are missing in certain scenes, in particular the mid-book climax was lacking some reactions from an enemy character as they're defeated and the ending was very fast as well which broke immersion a little. But all in all it was just a cracking read.
Everyone is sleeping on Jen Williams.
Great characterisation? Check.
Great worldbuilding? Check.
Eldritch beings with slight sci-fi slant? Double check.
This book is best experienced with as little primer as possible. Eldritch beings in a fantasy world is the pithy shorthand I will use. There are a lot of moving parts and Williams gives you morsels bit by bit. You don't understand what The Ninth Rain is until about a third of the way into the book. Alien creatures with an unknown intent, strange overgrown forest and wildlife, a once great civilisation dying with a whimper, an oppressive nunnery that imprisoners women for their magic.
And the three at the centre of it: an eccentric explorer, a vampire elf, and a pyrokinetic mage. There are two secondary perspectives as well but those are the main three.
Like her previous trilogy, The Copper Cat, she shows off her strength as an excellent character writer, able to draw out the distinctive voices of her cast and weave a story of intrigue and adventure. In general, it's a lot tighter than The Copper Cat. Williams has developed greatly as a writer to write intrigue but also in establishing setting and stakes. All three characters are distinctive and balanced excellently.
To be honest, there isn't much that isn't shining praise. There is so much to chew on about identity and purpose, love and loss, the ghosts of the past and the things we turn our attention, the things that drive us forward. It has trains in it too! Magically powered! Williams' prose is breezy and uncomplicated with a subtle hand for description with some gorgeous turns of phrase.
By and large my biggest criticism is that some details are missing in certain scenes, in particular the mid-book climax was lacking some reactions from an enemy character as they're defeated and the ending was very fast as well which broke immersion a little. But all in all it was just a cracking read.