Ninth House - Leigh Bardugo

Galaxy Stern is the most unusual freshman at Yale. At the age of twenty, she was the only survivor of multiple unsolved murders. But just then the unthinkable happens. While lying in the hospital, she is offered a second chance: a full scholarship to one of the most elite universities in the world. What is the matter, and why exactly?

Alex arrives in New Haven with a precise assignment given to her by her mysterious benefactors: to monitor the activities of secret societies at Yale. It is well known that these eight societies, in addition to ruling the campus for generations, create the future rich and powerful, from politicians to the biggest players on Wall Street and in Hollywood. However, their occult rituals turn out to be far more sinister and unusual than anyone's paranoid imagination could imagine.

Gods and aliens almighty, I don't know where to start. Lest I always be negative and look for a hair in the egg, let's start from the positive side of the novel.

The story is phenomenal. Leigh Bardugo met my expectations. From the very beginning, she's been spoon-feeding us information about Alex and Darlington. We know that she is his assistant, that they oversee the rites and rituals that the secret societies perform... But their backstories will leave you breathless. The investigation of the murder of a girl who has nothing to do with the University that Alex is leading on his own, then the cooperation with Detective Turner, Pamela Dawes, oh how I would like to have coffee with her, dean Sandow everything is so beautifully integrated and packed that I was literally sitting on the edge of my chair the whole time . When Alex's and Darlington's backstories unfolded, madre de dios, I felt like screaming. I think I even cursed out loud at one point, to which the dogs looked at me like "Here she is, she's going crazy over the book again."

Now what bugs me. My blog, my rules, so you'll have to put up with that too ;)

Ninth House is marked as a horror and adult book. Honestly, to me it looks more like a good mystery, thriller or detective novel with elements of the supernatural.

I kind of understand why horror, but that's not a good enough reason for me. Like there are ghosts and murders and butchery and everything. By that logic, Harry Potter is also a horror. Have people ever read Lovecraft, Ligotti, Poe, King, I could go on and on until tomorrow. And so, as someone who has been reading horror books since the age of ten, I would like to be explained what exactly is horror in this book. Please enlighten me!

Another thing that is not clear to me, a novel for adults. For what? I would easily give Ninth House to the kids to read. It's interesting enough. If the characteristic of the YA genre, in which Bardugo is, in my opinion, the queen, is that children/teenagers save the world, damn Alex and Darlington have barely crossed the threshold of twenty. They could also be teenagers and story wouldn't change. If it's not that, but the explicit content and violence, then we became real snowflakes and gentle stars. Well, in some cartoons that children watch, there is more violence than here.

  And we have come to the last item of my complaints. And this is only for Serbian translation.

Why is Vulkan still allowed to desecrate books with bad translation and the absence of editors and proofreaders, except on paper?! I really don't understand why they do this to us. I had the "misfortune" to read Ninth House in English. This translation hurt me. A lot of the atmosphere of the story itself is lost, there are a lot of grammatical and spelling mistakes, all in all, it must have been much, much better. First of all, a bad translation and the termination of Vulkan's cooperation with Goran Skrobonja, in my opinion the best translator in Serbia, are the reason why I stopped buying Stephen King's books that are published in our country. All the birds on the branch know that this two guys are responsible for my love of horror.

That's what I said. I'm ready for stones and fire. Whoever disagrees, feel free to get angry. While you enjoy the translations, I will read the sequel, Hell Bent, in the original ;)