The Priory of the Orange Tree by Samantha Shannon REVIEW

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Started: 29/10/19

Finsihed: 12/11/19

Spoilers: No

This will probably be a messy review. I’m struggling to put my thoughts into words.

I've been putting off reviewing this book because I have no idea what to say. I finished it a week ago and waited to allow my thoughts to steep, but it seems the longer I left it to consider, the more impassive I became towards this book.

I enjoyed it, but it wasn’t mind-blowing, so the idea of reviewing it feels like such a chore. This book took up so much of my time (Four weeks!) and for all that time dedicated, the only way I can really think to describe this book is . . well, a little underwhelming, tbh.

Characters This is where I struggled most in the book. Though I liked a lot of the characters, I felt disconnected from them all. There were so many of them, and though this isn’t normally an issue for me as I like large casts, There was only a small handful of characters I actually cared about.

I enjoyed Ead, Tane, Niclays and Loth. These are the four narrators of the book, and likely the reason I favoured them and felt closer to them. Out of the four I probably enjoyed Niclays the most. He was wretched and awful, morally grey, hopeless and miserable and broken. But all these things made him feel like the most real character in the book.

I couldn’t stand Sabran. I decided that pretty early on and my opinion never changed.

Unfortunately I found the f/f romance utterly flat. I love that there was one included, as it’s not something I see often in high fantasy, but I felt zero chemistry between the two women. I found it awkward to read because they felt like such an odd match. I didn’t feel any build up in this relationship. I can’t even describe this as slow burn romance, cause at least slow burn hints at feelings and builds tension. But between these two characters, there was nothing, then suddenly there was everything. I had far more feeling for Niclays and his tragic, wasted love for his long dead boyfriend.

Plot Is it just me, or does it almost feel like not a lot happened within 800+ pages? I guess for a book this size, I just expected more. I wanted to be wowed and instead, I think I’ve spent more time trying to convince myself this book is amazing than I did actually enjoying it.

Y’know what the glaringly obvious problem with this book is? It’s too long. Don’t get me wrong. I love a big old fantasy brick of a book, but only when it’s engaging throughout. A great example of this is The Black Prism, where every chapter is exciting. Exciting is not a word I’d use for Priory of the Orange Tree.

The plot was reminiscent of most classic high fantasy plot lines, but for some reason, I didn’t feel like the stakes were there. This book was hyped as the new Lord of the Rings. Lord of the Ring is a piece of art of which I love every part. To say Priory of the Orange Tree is the new LotR is just a little confusing. Why is it? Because it’s big? Because it has dragons? Because there’s a lot of characters? Where do the similarities start and the differences end?

Lord of the Rings is exciting, I fear for the characters and I can feel the stakes. Priory falls incredibly flat by comparison, (which is ultimately the downfall of so many books. Why can’t they stand on their own merit instead of being compared to others? Especially the lofty heights of LotR.)

I think because of all the comparisons it received, I expected something more. But all this being said, I didn’t dislike the book. This book was perfectly fine. I just feel like it could still be a perfectly fine book with about 200 fewer pages. In all honesty, I think the reason I continued reading and didn’t just DNF it halfway through was that I simply wanted to be able to say I’ve read this book. It’s massive! And that’s an achievement, however one may feel about the book.

Setting The setting and world-building are fantastic. It’s what carries this book really. I love an intricately detailed world. I enjoyed the history between all the kingdoms/queendoms and the politics that came attached to it all. And I found it interesting how the religion of Innys was based on a lie.

I only have one critique so far as the setting goes. Dragons. Let’s be real. We all came here for the dragons so . . . where are they? I know they’re there, I just expected a lot more page time from the dragons, whether fire dragons or water dragons, I just wanted more dragons. It was almost like they were an afterthought, second fiddle to a bunch of side character.

I loved the maps, however. I referred to these a lot as I wanted to orient myself in the world, and I found them very useful and very well drawn.

Writing Style There’s nothing particularly wrong with Shannon’s writing style. The writing itself is fine, but once again I feel disconnected. The things happening in the book didn’t seem to affect me. Maybe that’s due to my lack of enthusiasm towards the characters.

I started off really liking the book, everything seemed as it should be for a high fantasy, and I was hopeful that the more I read, I'd start liking the characters better.

I think it was somewhere between pages 500 and 600 where I started to flag. The pacing was really off. The fast exciting parts were too fast, and the slow burn parts had all but burnt themselves out. When I think of this book now, I don’t picture the awesome dragon-riding battle at the end, I picture a lot of court politics that wasn’t overly interesting. In theory this book should have been everything I wanted it to be. It should have been the best book of the year.

And yet . . . I just feel so indifferent about it. I didn’t hate it, but didn’t love it. It wasn’t terrible, but it wasn’t brilliant. It just is.

Indifference is the most frustrating feeling to have towards a book. How am I supposed to review it? How do I put Meh into an intellectual discussion? I just don’t know how I feel about this book at all.

Also, can I quickly gripe about how Shannon always inserts a glossary at the end of her books. No, I’m not reading a fucking glossary! This is the ultimate way to pull me out of a story, (almost as bad as footnotes.) I can’t stand glossaries. Lazy writing. If you’re making up words, find a way to explain it within the narrative or don’t make up words.

Final Impression This is the second Samantha Shannon book I’m giving an average rating to, and while I find it miles better than The Bone Season, it’s still not fantastic. I imagined this would be the book to flip my opinion about Shannon’s writing, but I think the truth is simply that her books aren’t for me.