A few weeks ago, I finished reading The Priory of the Orange Tree by Samantha Shannon. I wanted to write this a bit sooner, while it was fresher in my memory, but plans didn’t exactly work out that way. I will probably include spoilers below, but if all you’re here for is an overall opinion, it can be summed up as full of potential but falling far short of delivering on it.

I really, really wanted to like the book and repeatedly thought that I would be able to. The world was interesting, had potential hooks, and made me want to know more and then explore it. The premise was great.

What I ended up reading was a meandering slow-burn romance with way too little meaningful romance or progression that burned way too slowly until it suddenly became mutual and shared true love within just a couple of paragraphs. The fantasy elements were a series of macguffins that were dispatched in literal sentences after being introduced. More than once, the’main’ character stumbled on an ancient riddle and, with absolutely no foreshadowing or connection to previously introduced events, was just able to say, “Oh, I know the answer to this.”

The premise of the book also involves four point-of-view characters from different parts of the world, but again, they end up being a letdown. One is Ead, probably the only truly interesting character, who could probably best be described as a Mary Sue. She’s an assassin undercover in a medieval-style court to protect the queen. Loth is a bumbling fool with no sense of agency of his own. Niclays is an old man who does more internal monologuing about his regrets and past love than actually doing anything. Tané is a dragonrider who only becomes interesting in the last 100–150 pages. The first 6 or so chapters with her are just spent checking in on her dragon riding tests, which mostly involve hand-to-hand combat or archery from horseback. Nothing that changes the course of the book happens in most of her early chapters, and almost every character from them is quickly forgotten, only to have zero impact on the story.

I really liked the idea of the Nameless One returning, having to unravel the truth behind a set of religions based on flawed individuals, and the dual magic system. Unfortunately,  we see all too little of those things, and when we do, they aren’t earned and are done and over with as quickly as they appeared. The mortal enemy of all mankind is dispatched within 5 pages or so, and even the massive effort of uniting nations that we’ve been told through the whole book is separated and divided happens within the last 50 pages and really involves no difficulty other than a few conversations where our heroes ask nicely.

The queer relationships actually managed to be refreshing. The book sets them up as every-day occurrences. It wasn’t entirely obtuse about the realities around “bearing an heir,” though, although it felt like that could have been danced around a little less. The relationships themselves, though, as I said above, are way too slow to progress, suddenly happen, and then are just nearly perfect. They fail to earn their place in the book at all.

I’d like to believe there’s enough good here that if it were handled by a more mature or just a better author, it could have been a great, self-contained epic fantasy novel. I’ve heard better things about the prequel A Day of Fallen Night, so maybe someday I’ll have it in me to give it a shot.