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A review by veilchen24
The Priory of the Orange Tree by Samantha Shannon
5.0
I have seen this book being compared to Game of Thrones. Yes. If Game of Thrones was not inspired by a racist, homophobic, patriachal society. If Game of Thrones did not put female characters through severe sexual abuse. If Game of Thrones did not just kill people for the shock value. If Game of Thrones hada satisfying ending. In short: The Priory of the Orange Tree is Game of Thrones: If it was good. I know this is is not a review for GoT, but I just wanted this out of the way. Please do not compare this masterpiece to it, just because they are both high fantasy.
So what is this book? It's high fantasy, inspired by many different cultures, with very diverse and well thought out characters. But not only that: It also avoids many of the problems typical of this genre, that being sexism and homophobia. It's weird really, but when trying to set up the worldbuilding, too many authors come to the conclusion that women being treated as equals is too unrealistic - but dragons are fine. What's up with that?
Usually I'm not a fan of different POV's, because there is always that one person you don't care about. But not in this case. I really did enjoy all of the different perspectives and the author managed to always give more of exactly what i wanted. A+
The plot itself was fun and exciting enough to make me read 1100 pages. It moved forward at a steady, not to slow pace, had great build-up and resolutions. Were the mythological parts a bit predictable? Sure. But that's ok.
So yeah. If you have a few days, want to escape to a world without the Patriarchy, love dragons and women with swords and hate Game of Thrones with the same burning passion as I do: Read this book.
So what is this book? It's high fantasy, inspired by many different cultures, with very diverse and well thought out characters. But not only that: It also avoids many of the problems typical of this genre, that being sexism and homophobia. It's weird really, but when trying to set up the worldbuilding, too many authors come to the conclusion that women being treated as equals is too unrealistic - but dragons are fine. What's up with that?
Usually I'm not a fan of different POV's, because there is always that one person you don't care about. But not in this case. I really did enjoy all of the different perspectives and the author managed to always give more of exactly what i wanted. A+
The plot itself was fun and exciting enough to make me read 1100 pages. It moved forward at a steady, not to slow pace, had great build-up and resolutions. Were the mythological parts a bit predictable? Sure. But that's ok.
So yeah. If you have a few days, want to escape to a world without the Patriarchy, love dragons and women with swords and hate Game of Thrones with the same burning passion as I do: Read this book.