Ninth Life by Stark Holborn

I would like to thank the author and Titan Books for an advance copy of this novel in exchange for a fair and honest review

Publisher - Titan

Published - Out Now

Price - £8.99 paperback £5.99 Kindle ebook

After forty years of wreaking havoc across the galaxy, the outlaw Nine Lives – AKA Former General Gabriella Ortiz – has finally run out of lives. Shot down into a backwater at the system's edge, she is rescued by deputy marshall Havemercy Grey.

Hav is a true soul, trying to uphold what is right in the heedless wastes. Hav is determined to see justice done. And Hav could sure use that 20-million bounty...

But escorting the most dangerous fugitive in the system across the stars is no easy task, especially when decades of fire and destruction are catching up with her, and every gutspill with a pistol wants that bounty. So when Ortiz offers a deal - to keep them both alive, as long as Hav listens to the stories of Gabi's lives - Hav can't refuse.

There's just one catch: everywhere they go, during every brawl and gunfight and explosive escape, people say the same thing - don't let her talk...

Nb - this excellent story can be read as a standalone but it is also linked to events and characters in the great Ten Low (https://www.runalongtheshelves.net/blog/2021/6/27/ten-low-by-stark-holborn?format=amp ) and Hel’s Eight (https://www.runalongtheshelves.net/blog/2023/3/25/hels-eight-by-stark-holborn?format=amp)

A hero often assumes legend status in myth. Only certain events get remembered and as people misremember the stories and events new elements come. It’s why we have such interesting legends for King Arthur and Robin Hood. These days we focus perhaps too much on the hero’s journey and forget the messier path many often tread. In Stark Holborn’s brilliant science fiction novel Ninth Life we get the latest entry into these tales of the mysterious world of Fractus and also a novel that increases stage range scope and power of the wider universe it fits in as well as a reminder a hero is often so much more complicated than you think.

Gabriella Ortiz also known as Implacabilis, Hero of the Battle of Kin, Gabi The Dead General, Orts. La Pesadilla and Nine Lives is believed dead. The powerful system authority known as the Accord would however like proof and has issued a bounty wanted dead or alive. The young Deputy Havemercy Grey on a washed up mining world sees a crashed spacecraft and discovers Ortiz. Deciding the cash is better than the justice system Hav decides to take Ortiz to the Accord but swiftly every criminal and bounty hunter decides to give chase. Also Ortiz awakens and offers to be compliant on condition Hav simply listens to their life story. But listening is the one thing you are not supposed to do with the General.

I love it when a a series can take a surprising turn. So far the novels focused on a prisoner known as Ten and how Fractus a world that is also a space western setting is also a battleground between the Accord forces and the mysterious ‘Ifs’ a powerful alien entity that thrives on possibilities. In those Ortiz was a side character a young military genius supersoldier with a bad attitude who becomes a key friend and colleague of Ten. How Holborn focused the attention on Ortiz. Who exactly was she before meeting Ten and impressively in the decades after who does she become? In the process we get a non linear tale of multiple versions of one character and a reminder no one is ever quite the same person all their lives. It also increases the sale and scope of the series universe in a brilliant piece of storytelling.

Our main arc plot of the present is Ortiz and Hav journeying together supposedly as captor and prisoner. Hav is a lovely innocent who has never even been off world and is desperate for many reasons to leave. Ortiz is the prize money long dreamed of but we have contrasting the young innocent in the thirty something hard as nails General a veteran of battles, fights and who has indeed seen some things no one should ever see. She also appears haunted and able to see options when none appear available. Readers of the past series will be intrigued how Ortiz has become this mythical Nine Lives a despised pirate who caused mayhem for the Accord while for new readers she appear just a hugely compelling character who has clearly many secrets. But if you’re expecting a simple autobiographical tale fear not Holborn delivers something even more special.

While Hav and Nine Lives flee actors space meeting all sorts of bad and dangerous people Holborn breaks up Gabriella’s life into various arcs. The Nine stages of Ortiz’s life from acclaimed General and established readers will find much we did not know and for new readers shows us what the Accord was and why it’s dangerous. We get epic space battles, prisons, smuggler gangs, underground fight rings, rebellions and final stands galore. Holborn brings this universe to life in a way I was not expecting the world gets depth, texture and a sense of evolution. It’s no longer simply about Fractus but the use system and so many groups living in it. To deliver this is a few hundred pages is a great accomplishment.

Alongside that is the focus on Gabriella changing. We so often just see a lantern jawed hero do the right thing when required but that’s not the case. We see someone with PTSD hiding their scars in drugs and violence. We see then try to learn to be happy and then always being called into the fight. Often told in Gabriella’s hypnotic voice with Hav and a few other characters adding commentary this gains the feel of a character offering the truth when so often it’s been misreported. The child General of the previous books is now a woman who has lost herself to the bigger war and knows it’s not always made her happy but knows she must fight on. This time we feel we are in a veteran soldier’s presence and the way that comes across is really well told. Holborn has created unique voices of innocent and veteran combining well as the two start to understand one another and yet we never quite know how this will end up.

On top of this Holborn delivers a feast of action scenes with double crossing, space battles and across it all the cosmic weirdness of The Ifs making themselves known. There is a fantastic sense of the weirdness this piece of space offers and here Ten (also known as Hel) appears in guide more spookier than any we’ve seen before. It adds a mythic layer that all these characters are life’s in a bigger game we don’t yet fully understand. The depth of the story is amazing.

So yes as you can see I strongly recommend Ninth Life. Excellent storytelling, ambitious new levels of growth to the series and its bigger future history and size and yet it compelling. You can’t put it down for long without wanting to know what comes next. The best novel in this series so far and for me a further step in Holborn’s writing. I eagerly await to see what they have in store for us next. Go run and get it!