Move over Alecto! A new character is set to storm the necromantic brigade, breaking boundaries and altering the course of The Locked Tomb trilogy forever with Nona the Ninth, expanding the beloved antics of Harrowhark Nonagesimus, detailed exquisitely by Tamsyn Muir.
BOOK ANNOUNCEMENT! 💀
Nona the Ninth by @tazmuir, the third book in the Locked Tomb Series, coming Fall 2022!https://t.co/8WngB4srb9 pic.twitter.com/fDMnxzoZby
— Tordotcom Publishing (@TorDotComPub) July 30, 2021
Fans were quick to notice the shift from trilogy to series when pre-orders for the paperback edition of the second book in the series, Harrow the Ninth, went live late last week (July 30). Tordotcom Publishing was quick to follow up with an official announcement, including a note from Editor, Carl Engel-Laird:
At every step, The Locked Tomb Series has been a wild, weird, exciting, and surprising journey, and the process of concluding the series couldn’t be any different. Tamsyn Muir and I were as surprised as anyone when Nona arrived, bursting forth from Alecto the Ninth with an irrepressible energy and presence. She could not be contained, and demanded her own volume. And what a volume it is! Nona the Ninth will be a Locked Tomb novel like no other, and I’m very excited to share it with you. Look forward to meeting Nona, as well as a pack of rabid children, a menacing blue sky-circle, and at least one extremely good dog.
As of right now, it is unclear where Nona the Ninth falls in terms of timeline, but it is presumably a prequel, replacing Alecto the Ninth as the third book in the series – and taking its slated release time frame of fall 2022. Alecto will follow, and potentially conclude the series, in fall 2023.
How the surprise announcement affects Tordotcom Publishing’s five book deal (and release schedule) with Tamsyn Muir (announced by Bustle in 2020) remains unknown as well, though the initial terms suggest that Nona the Ninth falls outside of it. Of the five books included in the deal, three are slated to be cyberpunk, old-west influenced novellas, beginning with Go Marching In, while the other two have been penned as novels, as yet untitled, with one described by Muir as “a mid-apocalyptic fantasia set in the ruined kingdom of Logris, where the gods are vast flesh effigies, driven into battle by knights and witches.”
Regardless of where Nona takes us, Tamsyn Muir is a force to be reckoned with. With cover reveals still pending for all of Muir’s slated work, dedicated fans have something to look forward to in Harrow the Ninth’s paperback, which hits shelves September 21, 2021.
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