A review by sashayi72
The Priory of the Orange Tree by Samantha Shannon

slow-paced

1.0

This could have been 400 pages max. I was so frustrated by the unnecessary detail of world building for the first 200-250 pages by the time anything actually happened I was very underwhelmed. All the areas that could have had great moments to add detail are glossed over while unnecessary detail about would building suffocates the reader. Even the main love story is glossed over, very minimal build up and sparse information on how the characters feel for each other and their experiences with each other. It is clear this writer is a good writer in general, and there are some great sentences that I loved, but the story telling is off and I didnt feel like I was pulled within the world, which is ironic given how much world building occurred… I pushed through this book because of all the great reviews (where is the epic story everyone talks about?) but this was one book I would have been ok not picking up to begin with. The second half of the book gets better. The last 25% had some good action.