Tamsyn Muir Books In Order

Publication Order of The Locked Tomb Books

Publication Order of Standalone Novels

Publication Order of Short Stories/Novellas

Publication Order of Into Shadow Books

Publication Order of Anthologies

Tamsyn Muir, a Kiwi, has spent most of her life living in Howick, New Zealand, spending time in Waiuku and central Wellington. She lives and teaches in Oxford, in the United Kingdom.

She used to believe that being a New Zealander had not affected her writing all that much, either in setting or flavor. Moving to another country changed that. Being in New Zealand physically makes it easier to be a Kiwi writer. While living in the United Kingdom, she keeps coming back to New Zealand in a way she hadn’t in the past. Before her stories would be set in Germany or America, but the first story she sold since moving to the United Kingdom was set in Howick and Whitford.

Another story she worked on after leaving New Zealand she set in Waiuku, which is another town in Auckland that she used to live in. She finds she may have some certain stance that she writes from that is oddly Kiwi, and thinks she is only going to be able to identify it the more she lives and writes away from her home.

Muir is a huge Lovecraft fan, and one of her stories began from this enjoyment of his work. She knows that there are many things he stayed away from when he would write. Women and youth are two, just to name a couple. She wanted to see if she could tell a Lovecraft type story in which the protagonist was a teenager and all of the characters in the story are female. She also wanted to imagine Innsmouth with a Starbucks.

The only part of “The Deepwater Bride”, a novella Muir wrote, that is all that personal to her is that it is about a young queer woman. But she is not all that much like Aunt Mar or Hester, nor is she much like Rainbow. Which is a pity, since she would actually to be like Rainbow.

Before she went to Clarion she wrote only to amuse herself. She had been thinking about game writing, and still loves interactive fiction. A friend that had graduated from Clarion suggested she apply and so she did. She wound up having a Clarion experience that she finally began to see a story as its architecture, not just the surface. It was a total breakthrough for her.

It was not just the great instructors, but seventeen other writers that taught her how to stop biting her nails and get to it, and she always wishes she was back with them. She finds it too bad that they would not be able to get the Clarion of 2010, the one she attended, as it was a legendary one.

Clarion also helped give her the ability to see her work from the outside, or at the very least, get closer to doing so. The place is built around writing a story, then having thoughtful and smart people before they tear it to shreds, as kindly as they can. This makes it easier to adopt the persona of your own critic. See what you have written, spot the holes, and even spot where someone would come along and say that they had a problem with what you had written.

That is when you are able to figure out if it is a problem you want to fix, or if it is one you just want to leave it alone. Nobody is a good judge of their own work, so it helps to pretend to be another person for a time.

Her short fiction work has been nominated for the Shirley Jackson Award, the Nebula Award, the Eugie Foster Memorial Award, and the World Fantasy Award.

She writes horror, sci-fi, and fantasy, and has written both novels and short stories. Her debut novel, “Gideon the Ninth” was released in the year 2019, and is the first of her “Ninth House” trilogy.

“Gideon the Ninth” is the first novel in the “Ninth House” series, which was released in the year 2019. The Emperor needs necromancers. The Ninth Necromancer requires a swordsman. Gideon has got some dirty magazines, a sword, and has run out of time for undead nonsense.

Gideon was brought up by ossifying and unfriendly nuns, countless skeletons, and ancient retainers. He is ready to abandon the life of servitude she has been living and the afterlife she looks forward to as a reanimated corpse. She packs up her shoes, dirty magazines, sword, and prepares to launch her rather daring escape. Her childhood foe is not going to allow her to go free without a service.

Harrowhark Nonagesimus, who is Reverend Daughter of the Ninth House and bone witch, has just been summoned into the action. The Emperor has just invited the heirs to each of his loyal Houses to a lethal trial filled with skill and wits. If Harrowhark is successful she is going to become an all-powerful and immortal servant of the Resurrection, however no necromancer is able to ascend without their cavalier. Without Gideon’s own sword, Harrow is going to fail, and the Ninth House is going to die off. Of course, some things are better off dead.

Muir is able to effortlessly compile body horror, macabre humor, secrets, and tenderness into the sewn together corpse of a dark universe. These characters leap right off of the page, just as skillfully animated like arcane revenants. Not only does the adventurous novel embrace its own strangeness but, also wrings delight from it. The result of which is a heart-pounding epic science fantasy tale.

“The Deepwater Bride” is a novella that was released in the year 2015. Young Hester lives with Aunt Mar, who is the latest in the long-line of seers in the Blake family. It begins at Jamison Pond, and there are eldritch portents, as well as some research into the archives of the family that suggests to Hester that some dark lord is coming for a bride. She finds the girl that she thinks is the appointed on, and becomes friends with her.

This is a well written tale from Muir, as she captures both the teenager as well as the aunt nicely. Some found this story to be horrifying, with the talk of the teenagers to ring very true.