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A review by storykath
The Priory of the Orange Tree by Samantha Shannon
adventurous
dark
emotional
hopeful
mysterious
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.0
I ended up having very mixed feelings about this book, but overall I enjoyed it enough to give it a high rating.
Things I loved:
Dragons!! Good and evil dragons! Yes! Any story with dragons is going to capture my imagination, and I loved the variety of dragons and the characters' attitudes towards them, which felt real and engaging.
Multiple POVs: with this being such a long book with so many things happening, it was refreshing to cycle through multiple characters/locations/plots. This also meant that it took longer to feel like I had a good handle on all the moving parts in the novel, but it came together seamlessly enough as I went on.
Going along with that point, I found the pacing to be smooth and engaging. I've seen mixed reviews about the pacing of Priory, but it all felt natural to me. Of course the pace varied depending on what was happening, but it rarely felt out of control.
I have mixed feelings about:
The worldbuilding. Some aspects of the worldbuilding had wonderful nuance and ingenuity; I loved the concept of the dragonriders and the division of the East from the rest of the world. Other areas came across as more hastily put together. While kingdoms like Yscalin, the Erysr (really anything that wasn't Seiiki or Inys) are less relevant to the story, we only really learned surface-level details about them, and it often felt like they existed in service of the more central locations. The naming of places and characters was a mixed bag for me too - there are wonderfully unique names like Eadaz and Sabran alongside names like Margret and Arbella that jarred me with their similarity to real-world names. Additionally, the themes of politics and religion swung from 'insightful and nuanced and thought-provoking' to 'simplistic and rushed and unrealistic', although I will say that they fell into the former category more often.
On a similar worldbuilding note, the queer representation was a mixed bag, in my opinion. I was very much looking forward to reading a queer-inclusive fantasy, and we did get established M/M and F/F relationships. Minor spoilers ahead in my issues with these relationships. I was disappointed that both queer romances fell into a 'forbidden love' trope. If Shannon wants to establish that queer relationships are normalized in this universe, it would have been effective to have at least one character in a current, non-secret, same-gender relationship. I think there was one nobleman who made a passing mention to his husband, but I can hardly count that. I often found myself getting confused about whether it was the power difference between the partners that was the issue, or if it was the queerness, since the latter is a more accessible example in the real world. The relationship between Ead and Sabran was wonderful to read and very sweet, and while I know the book wasn't focused on the romance, I wish that more time could have been spent developing their relationship beyond just being romantic/sensual together. I feel like we missed out on seeing them just...being people in a relationship in the everyday sense.
The writing style itself. There was some absolutely beautiful prose in this novel, and I generally quite enjoyed the descriptions of architecture, nature, sensations, etc. At other times, especially in the description of emotions or characters, the writing felt clunky and tell-y (as opposed to show-y). I was immersed in the narrative one minute, and the next I was completely removed by a sentence or description that felt glaringly juvenile or simple. In a novel as long and complex as this one, there are a lot of opportunities for inconsistencies in character behaviour and writing style to come in and cause issues, and I feel that Priory fell victim to this at times.
Deaths for the purpose of other characters' development. I can understand that character death was inevitable in this novel, given the events of the story. However, many of the deaths of supporting characters felt like they occurred purely as a device to advance the plot or provide some kind of fuel for a main character. See Arbella dying to free up a spot among the Ladies of the Bedchamber, Kit dying in a random avalanche to harden Loth up, Susa dying to weigh Tané with guilt. Before their deaths, I had interest in these characters, where they'd go, what they'd do, but their deaths felt out of place and made me feel as though those characters had little purpose in the actual narrative.
Final thoughts
This is a beast of a book (approx. 16 hours of reading for me), and while it didn't meet all of my expectations, it was an accessible fantasy with an engaging premise, diverse characters, and a dynamic plot. I couldn't always totally lose myself in the story as a result of some of its shortcomings, but it's one that I would read again in order to pick up on more details and see more clearly how the strings of the narrative pull together.
Things I loved:
Dragons!! Good and evil dragons! Yes! Any story with dragons is going to capture my imagination, and I loved the variety of dragons and the characters' attitudes towards them, which felt real and engaging.
Multiple POVs: with this being such a long book with so many things happening, it was refreshing to cycle through multiple characters/locations/plots. This also meant that it took longer to feel like I had a good handle on all the moving parts in the novel, but it came together seamlessly enough as I went on.
Going along with that point, I found the pacing to be smooth and engaging. I've seen mixed reviews about the pacing of Priory, but it all felt natural to me. Of course the pace varied depending on what was happening, but it rarely felt out of control.
I have mixed feelings about:
The worldbuilding. Some aspects of the worldbuilding had wonderful nuance and ingenuity; I loved the concept of the dragonriders and the division of the East from the rest of the world. Other areas came across as more hastily put together. While kingdoms like Yscalin, the Erysr (really anything that wasn't Seiiki or Inys) are less relevant to the story, we only really learned surface-level details about them, and it often felt like they existed in service of the more central locations. The naming of places and characters was a mixed bag for me too - there are wonderfully unique names like Eadaz and Sabran alongside names like Margret and Arbella that jarred me with their similarity to real-world names. Additionally, the themes of politics and religion swung from 'insightful and nuanced and thought-provoking' to 'simplistic and rushed and unrealistic', although I will say that they fell into the former category more often.
On a similar worldbuilding note, the queer representation was a mixed bag, in my opinion. I was very much looking forward to reading a queer-inclusive fantasy, and we did get established M/M and F/F relationships. Minor spoilers ahead in my issues with these relationships.
The writing style itself. There was some absolutely beautiful prose in this novel, and I generally quite enjoyed the descriptions of architecture, nature, sensations, etc. At other times, especially in the description of emotions or characters, the writing felt clunky and tell-y (as opposed to show-y). I was immersed in the narrative one minute, and the next I was completely removed by a sentence or description that felt glaringly juvenile or simple. In a novel as long and complex as this one, there are a lot of opportunities for inconsistencies in character behaviour and writing style to come in and cause issues, and I feel that Priory fell victim to this at times.
Deaths for the purpose of other characters' development. I can understand that character death was inevitable in this novel, given the events of the story. However, many of the deaths of supporting characters felt like they occurred purely as a device to advance the plot or provide some kind of fuel for a main character.
Final thoughts
This is a beast of a book (approx. 16 hours of reading for me), and while it didn't meet all of my expectations, it was an accessible fantasy with an engaging premise, diverse characters, and a dynamic plot. I couldn't always totally lose myself in the story as a result of some of its shortcomings, but it's one that I would read again in order to pick up on more details and see more clearly how the strings of the narrative pull together.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Death of parent, Injury/Injury detail, Miscarriage, Murder, Pregnancy, Violence, and War
Moderate: Alcohol, Alcoholism, Blood, Body horror, Fire/Fire injury, Grief, Gore, Infertility, Infidelity, Mental illness, Religious bigotry, Sexual content, and Xenophobia
Minor: Animal death, Child death, Classism, Cursing, Excrement, Kidnapping, and Medical content