All very different but it was how their lives became entwined was the main appeal for this book even though their story, independent of each other, was unique, eventful, but also powerful. There’s this message I kept seeing throughout this book, these women trying to balance their relationships—be romantic or family—and the role the world has given them. However Shannon skilfully examines the issue from all perspectives and from a variety of different approaches to parenthood. It’s just that there’s lots of different pieces in this world, and it takes some time to get used to them all. It's a slower-paced, denser read than Priory, however I believe it to be the more entertaining and engaging.

But A Day of Fallen Night boasts an even higher count of sapphic relationships, alongside it's other incredible representation. The Priory’s existence is threatened, the dragons that have been asleep for a long time are awakening, Sabran the Ambitious has married the new King of Hróth, in the hope to save both realms from ruin, Dumai must awaken the gods and protect herself from the person intent on destroying her and when Dreadmount erupts these three women must be prepared and capable of protecting their people from its devastating threat of extinction. My main issue with The Priory is how the final conflict felt rushed and glossed over, but there were probably 10+ conflicts in Fallen Night and I thought the majority of them were believable and paced well. The engrossing new story promises to deliver more character-driven, emotionally complex adventure and intrigue. There are differences in cultures and beliefs and alliances that will provide fans of Priory a good amount of time to speculate how and when certain changes occur.

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It was a brilliant choice to establish so many varying geographies and cultures so that we could see how similar things affected each land differently and in which ways the lands each chose to combat them. The first book in a wildly inventive and mesmerizing new fantasy series from acclaimed author Josiah Bancroft where magical mysteries abound and only one team can solve them: The Hexologists. The only difference is her battlefields are council chambers, her weapons are letters and treaties, and her armour is Virtudom itself. Wulfert Glenn, a foundling and housecarl sworn to Glorian’s father, the king of Hróth, struggles to cast off whispers of witchcraft that cling to him from his mysterious past.Even mothers who mean well can do harm and on the opposite end of the scale, motherhood can also be used in toxic ways to 'own' a child. To calculate the overall star rating and percentage breakdown by star, we don’t use a simple average. Intricate and epic, A Day of Fallen Night sweeps readers back to the world of A Priory of the Orange Tree , showing us a course of events that shaped it for generations to come. A Day of Fallen Night is a subtle, slow burn political fantasy novel which explores various themes (which I'll get into) and while it does have plenty of action, it's main purpose is an examination of character interactions set against a backdrop of helplessness in the face of impossible odds. In this stunning epic fantasy, lush with detail and nuance, Shannon weaves a tale of three powerful women that intersect in the most thrilling ways.

I absolutely love soaps, and I am all for shades of them appearing in otherwise serious fantasy novels. The New York Times bestselling, stunning, standalone prequel to The Priory of the Orange Tree , now in paperback. We frail humans cannot generally stand in the path of an earthquake or a volcanic eruption and expect to emerge the victor, and it is the same with the wyrms or western dragons, and to a lesser extent the hybrid creatures who follow them.

I’m less present here nowadays, as I’ve realised I only have the concentration and willpower for one social media platform. At the end of the world, a woman must hide her secret power and find her kidnapped daughter in this "intricate and extraordinary" Hugo Award winning novel of power, oppression, and revolution. Series fans and any reader looking for queernorm fantasy will be thrilled by this self-assured adventure.

A Day of Fallen Night is Samantha Shannon’s standalone prequel to her acclaimed feminist fantasy, The Priory of the Orange Tree. I think the plot, especially for a nearly 900 page book, does drag at times, despite each chapter giving us some additional piece of the overall puzzle.

Also, it reads a bit like sitting over Samantha Shannon’s shoulder and watching her play tall in Crusader Kings 3 for hours on end. When I wrote Priory, I originally intended it to be a one-off standalone, but the longer I sat with it, the more I came to realise that this world had a much larger story to tell. In a book with such an epic scope it's hard to find a place to start when reviewing, but I will nevertheless attempt explaining how infatuated I am with this book in my mere words. with queer representation on the page, complex female characters, and a fantastical world that rivals Westeros, the pages simply fly by.