Ninth House

Ninth House (Alex Stern 1) by Leigh Bardugo

https://medium.com/@peterseanEsq/book-review-ya-urban-fantasy-necromancers-at-yale-3c8dd7e6a030

Alex Stern is a street kid from California. She is not Ivy League material: she uses drugs, lives with her loser drug-dealer boyfriend, and, occasionally services the men who her loser boyfriend wants to impress. She also sees ghosts.

Although sharing reality with ghosts has been a burden for her, it turns out that it is a talent that equips her for a full ride at Yale. It turns out that those well-connected “secret societies” at Princeton, such as Skull and Bones, are not just the follies of wealth snobs who make connections that they use for self-advancement for the rest of their life; they are also covens of magicians who trade their talents for influence in the real world.

One of the problems with magic is that it attracts ghosts, which can interfere with the magical rites. Since most people can't see ghosts, Alex is a perfect fit to join the ninth secret society, which ensures that the other eight don't abuse their powers.

Alex arrives as a Freshman and has to learn how to navigate lives as a Yale student and as a Dante - an apprentice in the House of Lethe - under the mentorship of a Vergil, namely, the cultured and experienced upper classmate named Darlington.

Then Darlington disappears, a murder occurs on Yale property, and Alex is pitched into the politics of Yale society and the secret societies.

This is Young Adult Urban Fantasy. It has the required elements of YA Fantasy, e.g., the hero is going through a life transition from childhood and life as an adult; she is put into an occult world that lies just behind the normal world; her quest is to learn what she must learn to survive this occult world; her new society is structured and organized in some way; and she has a special gift. These elements were all there and were presented entertainingly and engagingly.

What I particularly liked was the setting. Bardugo went to Yale and was a Wolf's Head secret society member. Bardugo knows Yale and the secret societies and their tombs. So, she writes with knowledge of the physical geography and backstory. Urban Fantasies should be about the occult - the hidden world lying just behind the mundane. Bardugo's knowledge of Yale allows her to present a realistic picture of the Yale everyone sees and the vision of what might be happening behind the walls.

Alex Stern is a fun character. She has some of the egregious “boss girl” attitudes of girl heroes. On the other hand, Alexa's character arc involves learning and improving rather than gliding effortlessly through troubles.

This books sets up the mystery, solves it, and sets up a second mystery for book two, which I intend to read.