The Priory of the Orange Tree by Samantha Shannon

Summary:

With a truly great number of POVs and intertwined plots, people all over the continent attempt to vanquish the Nameless One and prevent his return.

My Review:

My God. Oh boy.

First of all, there are three reasons why people read Priory: it’s sapphic, it’s great to be able to say you read it since it’s long and dense, and actually reading the summary. Kidding, it’s only the first two. Did I have any idea what the plot was? Haha. No. I read it because it’s pride month and it had been on my TBR forever. HOWEVER. I do not regret reading it in the slightest.

This was originally supposed to be a buddy read with my best friend. We had resolved to read 80 pages a day for ten days! For the first three days, I read a whole zero! This book is impossible to start. I talked to someone who’s a HUGE fan of the book when I was around 170 pages in and when I told her this, she said, “Oh, so you’re almost at the start of the plot!” It’s an 800-page book, but most of the characters have nothing to do for almost 200 pages! This isn’t great.

However, once you get to the plot, it’s impossible to stop. It’s filled with likable, complex characters, intricate worldbuilding, and above all, politics and adventure. The book is just so good in terms of quality that you can’t fault it for being slow. On my fourth day of “reading,” I actually read around 80 pages, the next day 100, then 100, then 200, then 300. Once I actually got into it, I flew through. As I write this review though, my friend still isn’t done. My bad.

It’s rare that a book can be so intricate and dense and still have me know what’s going on. Not only did I keep up, but I understood everything happening in the book, which I appreciated since it’s an 800-page adult high fantasy with a detailed nobility system and four POVs.

I realize I haven’t said much about the content of the book, but you really don’t even need that to want to read it. I had no idea what I was getting into and I loved it. Despite this, I’ll give a couple character descriptions so the POVs are easier to understand.

Ead: lady-in-waiting to the queen. Sent by an order from the South to protect Sabran (In West)

Sabran: Queen of Inys (In West).

Loth: friend to Ead and Sabran, nobleman. Sent away by powerful spy for Sabran because the lord thought he was ruining Sabran’s marriage prospects (In West, then South).

Tané: aspiring dragon rider, sheltered an outsider and has to hide this to become a dragon rider after years of training (In East).

Niclays: disgraced and depressed alchemist hired to find the secret to immortality for Sabran and then exiled after failure. Forced to shelter the outsider Tané hid (In East).

I’d recommend Priory to anyone who can handle a very dense but very good adult fantasy. REMEMBER THE FIRST 200 PAGES AREN’T AS GOOD AS THE REST. Happy reading!

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️💫/5