I feel so fortunate that I was able to experience this story now.

This was such a beautifully woven and intricate story that I just could not put down. Shannon has written an epic fantasy masterpiece. I found myself enjoying this journey more than I enjoyed Priory. I am just so in love with A Day of Fallen Night. This is hands down the best book I have read this year. People always ask what my favorite book is and I never have an answer. I read so much it's always so hard for me to just pick one out of the hundreds of stories I have immersed myself in. Well now I can answer confidently that A Day of Fallen Night is at the top of the list.
This story with its multiple POVs along with the Priory gave me major Lord of the Rings vibes. Everyone in their own lives fighting individual battles to bring down a great evil is something I live for. I get so excited when I know these people from different walks of life and different origins eventually end up crossing paths. What made me absolutely fall head over heels for this book was the WOMEN and their resilience. I grew up reading Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings and those stories did have 1 or 2 strong female characters. This book however has multiple strong and fearless women that I wish I had had with me as a little girl in my fantasy books. I was also so happy with the queer representation in this book. Since I read The Priory of the Orange Tree first I kind of knew how the magic system, dragons and wyrms worked so I felt like I could focus more on the individual characters.
I really enjoyed the setting up of the events that eventually happen in the Priory.
I almost wish I would have read this book first but that's okay I still enjoyed the journey even though I knew how it would end. I cannot wait for others to read this wonderful piece of art.

P.S.
More Wulfert Glenn please and thank you.

Thank you thank you Samantha Shannon, NetGally and Bloomsbury for giving me a chance to read A Day of Fallen Night. First off I never thought that Samantha could top Priory and BOY DID SHE! This girl is thick and a beast but so much fun to read! I absolutely love our main cast of characters and really enjoyed all of the side characters! The ending though! I love how Samantha can really twist what happens towards the end and show you something you never thought would happen! I would say this is ENTIRELY better than Priory and I absolutely adore that novel! I cannot wait for everyone else to read this beauty! Samantha you have done it again and brought us a masterpiece in the Epic Fantasy realm!

Thank you to Samantha Shannon, Bloomsbury, and NetGalley for a chance to read A Day of Fallen Night!

First I’d like to say that I haven’t read Priory of the Orange Tree yet. But when I saw this book on NetGalley and heard that it was a standalone set in the same universe I decided to give it a go!

I do think there were some instances where having Priory first would have been helpful, but that was only really in the very beginning of the book when there were a lot of kingdoms and places being named that I didn’t have any knowledge of.

The story itself was fantastic, there were parts that seemed interconnected that I thought would converge later in the story and didn’t, only for other parts that I wasn’t expecting to be related becoming “how did I not see this coming!” parts later on.

The story telling itself was wonderful. The language was so descriptive and really helped make you feel like you were immersed in some of these places and made it so easy to imagine what things looked like or even smelled like. There were a few parts that I thought were overly flowery and made things more confusing then they needed to be, but overall I thought those were minimal enough that they didn’t take away from the rest of the story.

I think if you read Priory and liked it to DEFINITELY read this book and if you didn’t read Priory but are a fan of fantasy this is still something I would definitely recommend!

When Priory came out, I was sure that Samantha Shannon couldn't top its sheer excellence. I was equal parts hopeful and nervous coming into A Day of Fallen Night, especially considering it's a prequel that contains a completely new cast of characters. I don't know why I doubted Shannon, though, because somehow, Fallen Night is not just as good as Priory, it's better. The characters are a work of art, each of them thoroughly fleshed-out and given adequate time to develop over the course of the story. I knew that Samantha Shannon could write, but Fallen Night is something really special. Wulf, Glorian, Tuva, and Dumai have literally become some of my favorite book characters ever (WULF AND GLORIAN IN PARTICULAR!). Not to mention, the side characters and their relationships with the main cast are spectacularly done. The romance is just *chef's kiss* and the reveals towards the end (iykyk) had me SHOOK. While its predecessor admittedly took me some time, I devoured this book in half the time. The buildup to the firework of an ending truly delivered and I wasn't bored by a single POV. Even in the beginning stages of the story it was clear that Fallen Night was and is a special book. I can't recommend this enough to first time readers and returning Priory fans – I've fallen in love with this new cast and I know everyone will, too. Dare I say it, this book is leagues better than Priory to me even though Priory is literally amazing??? Samantha Shannon is too powerful fr

In A Day of Fallen Night, Samantha Shannon absolutely delivers for Priory of the Orange Tree fans. This follow up prequel gives incredible depth to a world already well fleshed out in the first book, and adds history and color to her lore. My favorite thing about Priory was that it was a standalone novel: it contained everything I needed to enjoy the story in one chunky tomb. I loved it, and was excited to hear that there would be further material published in this world, but had trepidations about Fallen Night. This novel blew me away. It absolutely sucked me in all over again, with a new cast of characters and new world changing conflict. I will 100% be recommending this title to any fantasy fans, readers who enjoy intergenerational sagas, or fans of diverse world building.

Thank you NetGalley and Bloomsbury for allowing me to read this ARC for an honest review!

A Day of Fallen Night was probably one of my top 5 reads of 2022. I was not a huge fan of Priory of the Orange Tree but this prequel may have changed that opinion.

Samantha Shannon has done an amazing job at continuing a story meant to be a stand alone novel and turned it into a masterpiece series. ADOFN uses the same format as in Priory and brings new and continuing story lines to enhance the overall plot.

Shannon has gone above and beyond to include diverse story telling and characters that I believe will be talked about for centuries to come.

ADOFN takes place 5 centuries before Priory but seamless intertwines the stories. This prequel is more emotional and action packed than it’s original story. I wish I could go into more detail of the book, but I’m not one to give out spoilers!

Everyone needs to read this!

The world building in this book is phenomenal! The writing is so lyrical and beautiful. Such an amazing prequel! As someone who is newer to high fantasy this book was an amazing jumping off point! I would highly recommend this book to anyone who is a fan of The Priory Of The Orange Tree and any other high fantasy with political intrigue!

This is a breathtaking prequel to The Priory of the Orange Tree. It feels more epic and there are even more main characters (including more queer characters). I loved each of the storytellers and really appreciated the slow burn way they all intertwined. While this definitely can stand alone, I think reading it after Priory was a special experience because it gives background for the world and explains how certain things came to be. I also loved meeting the ancestors of the characters.
The story in the book is intense, heartbreaking, and at times really scary. There are major themes of identity, grief, and family. I felt really emotional reading this book and grew to love the characters.
Highly HIGHLY recommend. This exceeded my expectations!
CW: childbirth, pregnancy, forced pregnancy, grief, plague

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for this ARC!

You will feel all the emotions! Through the highs and lows I couldn't put it down. The world is just as rich and intoxicating as Priory, if not more. I don't want to give anything away, so I have to keep this short and sweet, but you've gotta read it!

AHHH I CAN'T BELIEVE THAT I ACTUALLY JUST READ THIS BOOK!! Okay, calm down Kayleen, deep breaths. So this book was fucking amazing. It's a Samantha Shannon book, excellence is the state of things. It was so interesting to read about the different characters that were mentioned in PRIORY. We got to see their motives and just all their lives. This was a truly amazing book and if you loved PRIORY, you will not be disappointed.

Thank you, thank you so much to the publisher for sending me a copy of one of my most anticipated reads of 2023.
ADOFN was one of the best book I've read this year. Or ever. Samantha Shannon outdid herself.
The story is told by multiple POVs, spanning generations, religions, traditions and places. Tunuva, a fifty years old sister of the Priory, with a new generation of sisters who fight to believe in their purpose against the wyrms, since it's been a while since their appearances. In the North, Sabran is the proud queen of her queendom and she has married King of Hróth, narrowly saving both realms from ruin. Now their daughter Glorian follows her footsteps. In the East Dumai has always lived in a Seikenese mountain temple, the dragons are sleeping for centuries, but a visitor from her mother's past uphend her future. Wulf, on the other side, is a young soldier, whose past is ready to change everything. When a disastrous eruption from Dreadmouth brings ruins and devastation, these women will have to face the world and be prepared to do anything.

With masterful storytelling, deep and complex characterization and a intricate plot spanning seas, times and spaces, the story is long and wonderful and even though the book is huge it never bores or lags, never. It's fascinating, deep, full of twists and interesting characters and it was such a pleasure following them in their physical and physicological growth, through losses and discoveries, adventures and secrets, sacrifices and gains.
The story is raw, complex, brilliant and her creativity and characterization are truly magnificent. It's a queer book, wonderfully and brilliantly queer. I fell in love with Glorian, Dumai, Wulf and Tunuva, following the main characters' journeys and growth. It's a story that touches important themes like family, loyalty, motherhood (lost, found, forced) growing up, the pressure to live to someone's expectations, the courage of being oneself. It's about love and war, dragons and gods, magic and destiny, fights and adventures. The scope is huge, magnificent and every single character is skillfully written in their complexity. I can't wait to hug my copy.

It's not often that I enjoy "supplementary" book content. Prequels, spin-offs, novellas, etc. usually don't interest me, but I of course had to throw caution to the wind when I heard about A Day of Fallen Night. I so rarely have "auto-read" authors, but Samantha Shannon is one of them, and I adored Priory so it seemed an easy chance to take.
A Day of Fallen Night is STUNNING. The prose is sublime, beautiful in its tone and cadence. I'm not one to annotate while I read, but the heaps and heaps of quotable lines and breathtaking descriptions basically forced my hand. It's poetry in the form of a novel.
The plot itself was also great. I was nervous to see it come together, after all we do know how the story ends, but it really worked. A bit slower, purposeful pacing, but I didn't mind that.
Also the cover is just gorgeous. I need a physical copy for my shelf!

TW: violence, war, forced pregnancy, traumatic childbirth, child marriage, reproductive coercion, religious manipulation/bigotry, grief, climate change, pandemic, postnatal depression, animal violence/death, mind control, vomiting, child loss, parental death, and massacre

You know that Circe quote that goes on about "when another soul dips nears yours..." yadda yadda.. "such a constellation was he to me?" That was me with A Day of Fallen Night. I've always believed that The Priory of the Orange Tree was the dragon high fantasy that would forever hold a special place in my heart, but now Day has given it a run for its money to the point where I'm torn on which of these stories means more to me. Both are phenomenal masterpieces of emotional turmoil, but Day brings stronger politics, a wider cast, and even more sapphic love—UGH, WHAT MORE DO YOU NEED?!

This review is going to be shorter than most of my other ones. February is still six months away, and I don't want to go anywhere near giving too much away. A few significant differences between Day and its predecessor is that Day has more POVs than Priory. There's still four main POVs within Day, but there's also a few singular perspectives that join the story for a very short amount of time. A few of those scenes are actually some of my top chapters. Moreover, there's three main women perspectives and then a fourth perspective that hasn't really been mentioned in the synopsis, so I'm not going to give any details to that character. If you remember any of the history from Priory, then you'll somewhat know a bit about one character—Glorian III. She's the daughter of Sabran VI and Bardholt I of Hróth. She's heir to the Queendom of Inys and Hróth, and Day starts when she is merely fifteen years old. Then we have Tunuva Melim; she's the tomb keeper for the Priory and guardian to the remains of Cleolind Onjenyu. Through, Tunuva we gain an insight into the Priory like never before, which I loved about her chapters. Finally, Dumai of Ipyeda is a godsinger at the High Temple of Kwiriki in Seiiki. She has lived atop a mountain all of her life, but things quickly change the night two strangers appear at their Temple's doorstep. All of these women—and the ones not POVs—will leave their mark on you. Samantha has written the deepest fantasy about women that I have ever read. Part of this is because she follows such variety of ages and experiences of women in different positions across the globe. I'm excited to do my reread of Priory because I've forgotten how detailed and raw Samantha writes when it comes to women, specifically motherhood, and subsequently grief. You'll cry and scream, smile and laugh, shut the book and throw it across the room (couldn't do that with my phone lol) because it is just THAT GOOD.

Besides the story itself, a lot of people have asked me if I think you should read Day before Priory or the opposite, and I think it depends. I originally wanted to read Priory first, but when the eARC showed up in my inbox, I knew I couldn't wait a moment longer to start Day. If you want an easier jump into this world, then I'd recommend Priory. It has a smaller cast of characters and less complicated politics. But if you choose this direction, then you'll be historically spoiled for Day since it happens centuries before Priory and one of the characters is extremely well known. A reminder though— history has a tendency to alter the true facts of a historical moment. It's one of Day's many themes, and I can't wait to dive into my Priory reread and connect even more dots.

That's all I have for now because anything more feels too close to spoilers! All I can continue to say is READ. THE. ROOTS. OF. CHAOS. It won't let you down in the slightest.

Thank you NetGalley/ Bloomsbury for making my dream come true and gifting me this eARC. I'm down bad for this world and Samantha, so this made my entire month.

Starting this book, I wasn’t sure how I would feel because I loved Priory so much. In my mind, I didn’t think anything could top it. Samantha Shannon proved me wrong. This book is GORGEOUS from beginning to end. The characters are compelling, and watching their change and growth throughout the 880 pages of this novel was a delight.

One of my favorite aspects of Shannon’s writing is how diversity is never forced in this world. It simply is. It’s always amazing to read a story where diversity of race, gender, sexuality, and ability are universally accepted by everyone. Homophobia and transphobia don’t exist. One character is referred to with gender neutral pronouns and titles. Others are canonically transgender. Many are queer. This is never questioned by the characters; it is just accepted as a way of life. In that way, I wish our world could be a little like the world of the Roots of Chaos.

I actually found that I prefer this book to Priory. Readers might find that they’re very similar (chapters following different characters in separate parts of the world as their stories come together to defeat a great evil), but I thought that there was a lot more political intrigue and more dynamic and interesting character relationships. I really found myself attached to all of the characters. In multi-POV stories, I often find that there are certain characters that I’m less interested in reading about. That’s not the case here. The characters are ALL dynamic and interesting in their own ways and I devoured this book because of that.

In short, I think that if you enjoyed Priory, you will enjoy A Day of Fallen Night. If you’re like me, you might even like it more.

However you felt about The Priory of the Orange Tree probably determines how you'll feel about A Day of Fallen Night, as Samantha Shannon sticks pretty hard to the formula that she rode to BookTok fame. If the chain of Virtudom ain't broke, no need to add another link — or something like that.

The good: Shannon's knack for writing complex characters that you really, truly care about shines once again here. Her cast of characters are refreshingly diverse, in the way that humans are, but that's no surprise after Priory. All four of ADOFN's POV characters fit perfectly into her universe, and it was a thrill getting to know them. Glorian is probably my favorite character across both books. It was so good to finally have a Berethnet narrator, and damn, is her arc harrowing and satisfying.

The mixed bag: We see even more of the world in ADOFN, but it doesn't always thrill. On one hand, there's a crazy imaginative description of a Lacustrine palace built to honor the heavens (I'd love to see that on screen someday). On the other, Hroth doesn't conjure much beyond generic Viking-land and nothing consequential comes from the very intriguing idea of a republic existing in this world.

The bad: ADOFN suffers big time from prequel-itis. While you can definitely read it first, most folks are probably going to tackle it after Priory, so you already know the broad strokes of what happens here. That seriously lowers the stakes from the get-go. Even its general structure has a lot in common with the flaws of its big sister: a lot of setup for a pretty abrupt conclusion.

The bottom line: A solid 4 stars. I finished this 880-page doorstop in less than a week, so it was definitely compelling — but I can't help but feel it's a step down from the dizzying heights of Priory.

A Day of Fallen Night is, definitely, more of the same. The story of it is really brilliant, and i wished so much The Priory of Orange Tree to be a universe and not just a single book, and the complexity of the main characters and the main plot made me to read the book in just some hours, although I was expecting different things, I received more of the same and the story is so graceful that it made me even less bothered by it. Shannon really knows how to write a book and I think that while the universe might pass off that dull image it will still develop in an amazing way.

4,0 stars

First, thank you to NetGalley for giving me the chance to read what I was sure would be my favorite book of 2023, in 2022.

Now for the book. It is utterly amazing. Even better than Priory, the characters are fantastic and have depth. The storyline helps to better Priory, while also building an incredibly detailed and in-depth world and experience of its own.

I have to say that this is my favorite book of 2022. It makes me want to read Priory all over again, just so I can see the many connections between the storylines.

In closing, I hope that the length of these books don’t scare people away from reading them. The length is really one of the many things that makes them special and the pages go by so quickly.

Read these books!

Priory of the Orange Tree is my favorite standalone fantasy novel so I went into A Day of Fallen Night with the highest of expectations and they were EXCEEDED! There were times I laughed, cried, gasped, and my jaw hit the floor at least three times. The Roots of Chaos world has the absolute finest world building of any work of fiction I’ve ever come across, it’s magnificent. The regions, religions, politics, and history are so rich and perfect these books feel like portals to another world. I can’t say enough positive things about ADOFN and I can’t wait for it to hit shelves and get to hold it and savor its presence.