The Ninth Rain by Jen Williams starts off with a prologue, highlighting an event occuring 200 years ago. Typically when starting off with an epic saga, the reader often expects hearing about the hero of the tale, while the morally compromised characters are introduced later as the story deepens. This idea is cleverly flipped in the first few pages of the book.

“‘Tormalin the Oathless’, she spat, taking a step away from him. ‘That’s what they called you, because you were feckless and a layabout, and I thought, how dare they call my brother so? Even in jest. But they were right. You care about nothing but yourself, Oathless one.’”

I liked how the back story is provided through letters by Lady Vintage in the start of each chapter. This eliminates the need for a narrator.

“You really study these things?” In the dim light the witch’s face looked really dirty, with its traces of ash. “What for? I mean really what for?” “For the joy of knowing, of course!” She patted the girl’s arm. “It helps to understand things, don’t you think? It makes them less alarming.” Noon looked unconvinced. “Things are less alarming when you put a lot of space between you and them. Hiding is easier.”

The author’s use of similes and metaphors to evoke images in the mind of the reader are quite breathtaking:

His words were quiet, but both parasite spirits turned to regard him, lights spinning in their flesh like the stars after one too many glasses of wine.”

With no more than that, Hestillion was dragging him back across the gardens, her bare hand an icy cuff on his arm.

Her use of colors to paint an image is also fantastic:

The moonlight had turned Bern’s golden hair silver, and, standing on the summit of the small hill, he looked to Aldasair like some sort of unlikely statue.

The glass roof was full of lilac light, as night shaded into day.

It is interesting to see how the author ends any chapter. It looks like it is a thought - narrative - thought scheme.

‘I - Lord, I am honored.’ There were so many questions, but Hestillion forced them all from her mind. They had clearly done something to lose Ygseril’s trust. It was now her responsibility to win it back. ‘Whatever you wish of me.’

The light did fade then, but Hestillion felt a warmth from it that she hadn’t felt before, and she knew that in some form Ygseril had expressed his approval. Fighting back up through the netherdark, she awoke stiff and cold, crouched on the roots.

‘My responsibility,’ she said, stroking the twisted bark. ‘My responsibility, alone’.

Some sentences are pure works of art.

‘Hest? Hest, it’s me.’ He shouted across the hall, too aware of how his words were eaten up by the space between them.