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crispycritter 's review for:
The Priory of the Orange Tree
by Samantha Shannon
Another epic fantasy door stopper that did not earn its page count. I suffered through it all. I deserve some sort of medal.
Boring. Characters I felt nothing for. Deux ex machinas everywhere that robbed the book of tension and stakes. Predictable character deaths that felt like Shannon wanted to imitate Grrm but didn’t have the guts to really kill off anyone of consequence. A romance? No. This was not romance. Choppy, monotonous sentence structure. I know this is very personal but I really did not care for Shannon’s style of prose. I felt like it was hard to read - almost like trying to swim upstream instead of just flowing down a river, digesting information. The most low-effort obvious metaphors. Sabran is a rose but also so are her nipples, guys. Often done as similies that I felt put distance between me and the text. She’d do this thing where she’d describe a part instead of the whole during fight scenes (can’t remember the name for this figure of speech) and I’ve never felt so removed from the action going on.
World building - this is just a mash up of medieval history in the east and west. I felt like Shannon put such an emphasis on using period-correct names for pieces of clothing and listing food and didn’t give nearly as many shits about storytelling.
Glossaries and timelines and character lists: I’m sorry, y’all, but these need to be supplemental. You should be able to understand the book without them.
Maps: the fuck couldn’t we get a full map? Why were the place names off to the sides in the ocean?? Who made this? 👎
I complained in the buddy read but I’m going to complain here. At over 700 pages, we have time to go into detail about beheadings and other acts of violence. We get ALLLMOST sex scenes that read like some fade-to-black boddice ripper from a 1990s historical romance. I get that folks have different levels of comfort with on page “spice” 🙄 and “smut” 🙄. But I really want folks, particularly in the epic fantasy community, to explain to me why it’s okay or meaningful or drives the plot forward to have on-page violence yet a consensual sex scene serves no purpose? Just titillates? Why can’t I be MFin titillated, Matt. Reading about DRAGONS isn’t meant to entertain me too?!? Be so for real.
Some of you are out here crying feminism! Queer representation! In epic fantasy! And I get that there is not a lot out there that has reached this level of commercial success. I just feel like this book, at the end of the day, gave us crumbs. I think we can do a lot better.
Boring. Characters I felt nothing for. Deux ex machinas everywhere that robbed the book of tension and stakes. Predictable character deaths that felt like Shannon wanted to imitate Grrm but didn’t have the guts to really kill off anyone of consequence. A romance? No. This was not romance. Choppy, monotonous sentence structure. I know this is very personal but I really did not care for Shannon’s style of prose. I felt like it was hard to read - almost like trying to swim upstream instead of just flowing down a river, digesting information. The most low-effort obvious metaphors. Sabran is a rose but also so are her nipples, guys. Often done as similies that I felt put distance between me and the text. She’d do this thing where she’d describe a part instead of the whole during fight scenes (can’t remember the name for this figure of speech) and I’ve never felt so removed from the action going on.
World building - this is just a mash up of medieval history in the east and west. I felt like Shannon put such an emphasis on using period-correct names for pieces of clothing and listing food and didn’t give nearly as many shits about storytelling.
Glossaries and timelines and character lists: I’m sorry, y’all, but these need to be supplemental. You should be able to understand the book without them.
Maps: the fuck couldn’t we get a full map? Why were the place names off to the sides in the ocean?? Who made this? 👎
I complained in the buddy read but I’m going to complain here. At over 700 pages, we have time to go into detail about beheadings and other acts of violence. We get ALLLMOST sex scenes that read like some fade-to-black boddice ripper from a 1990s historical romance. I get that folks have different levels of comfort with on page “spice” 🙄 and “smut” 🙄. But I really want folks, particularly in the epic fantasy community, to explain to me why it’s okay or meaningful or drives the plot forward to have on-page violence yet a consensual sex scene serves no purpose? Just titillates? Why can’t I be MFin titillated, Matt. Reading about DRAGONS isn’t meant to entertain me too?!? Be so for real.
Some of you are out here crying feminism! Queer representation! In epic fantasy! And I get that there is not a lot out there that has reached this level of commercial success. I just feel like this book, at the end of the day, gave us crumbs. I think we can do a lot better.