This is my first read from Ann Leckie, and I regret that it took me this long—but this was a good choice for my first foray into her works. For one, I love having a standalone fantasy novel—not every story needs to be marketed into a trilogy, publishers, please. This novel is told in a mix of first- and second-person narrative, due to the fact that it is told from the perspective of one of many gods that inhabit this world. The Raven Tower addresses themes of divinity, language, revenge, and others—all of which made me pick up this book not too long after reading the blurb. (That, and the incredible cover.) It’s a wonder that this didn’t spend much time on my TBR shelf.

The worldbuilding was decently done—I found it was just enough to pepper the story with interesting details. It was a bit overwhelming at first, especially the geography for me—I had a hard time keeping track of what was where. I consulted the map but it didn’t seem to help me much. That’s probably just a me thing, since I don’t visualize when I read. It wasn’t significant to the reading experience though. The main area we are concerned with is the kingdom of Iraden (though can you even call it a kingdom when its ruler is not a king…?), which is ruled by the Raven god and its Lease. The world had a vague medieval feel to it, which I enjoy in fantasy works, but it wasn’t anything mind-blowing. Still, I liked being in this world while reading alongside its characters.

The characters also add a lot of depth to this story. I quite enjoyed the main character, Eolo, but I was pleasantly surprised by the stories given to some of the minor and supporting characters. I do wish that Leckie had given some of the more prominent characters more personality details or development throughout the story, but this story focuses mostly on the god narrating it and Eolo. Perhaps my favorite character was the narrator god, just because of the complexity of that story and how Leckie weaves it all together with the story about Eolo and Mawat. I also did enjoy that Eolo was a trans character whose identity was not at all relevant to the plot—it wasn’t a big deal, and I wish more writers took this route in writing trans characters.

Since this was apparently inspired by Hamlet, the plot was not difficult to follow and at times quite predictable. But this is not merely a Hamlet adaptation—there are definitely some clever twists and turns in the narrative. It may be that I was in a reading slump, but I found it hard to get myself into the novel—even though I was really captivated by the premise and world and voices, I couldn’t read more than a few pages at a time. There is a lot going on in this book, so I am nonetheless glad I read it a bit slowly and got the chance to take everything in. While some parts were predictable and others slow-moving, the last third or so of the book really takes off and had me speeding through the pages. Perhaps because this is a standalone, the ending felt a bit rushed—we were still given new information where the resolution should have kicked off, which felt odd. As a result, the pacing of this book is a bit over the place, but I still enjoyed how the narrative was resolved and the overall reading experience.

While this isn’t a groundbreaking fantasy novel in my estimation, I still enjoyed the ideas Leckie presents in this novel—and this, more than anything, is the greatest strength of the book. The narrative was decent and the characters enjoyable enough, but I loved the ideas about gods, the use of language, and what all of that could entail. Some parts I felt were more deserving of a 4-star rating while others were 2-star at best, so this was a hard book to rate. If you’re weirdly into those particular subjects like I am, and also enjoy medieval-esque fantasy and Shakespearean style narratives, then this book is definitely going to be up your alley.