The thing I enjoyed the most about the Saint of Bright Doors is the way my expectations were constantly dashed. The first line starts the book off feeling like a dark fantasy, as Fetter's shadow is stripped away from him. But from there he grows up some and moves to a city where there's all sorts of technology that make it feel like a parallel modern universe. But there's also subterfuge and revolution, group therapy for (non)-chosen ones, complicated family, and the mire of prison bureaucracy.

I think overall it's just different than a lot of books I've read, and I appreciate the myriad ideas it's trying to fit together. The pacing and narrative arc were not what I had expected, but somehow it was a delight all the same.

(One minor point that hit home is that this is in part a story of plagues and pogroms; and, horrifyingly that people have become so inured to them that they are "seasonal" and rich people take vacations to avoid them. I also appreciated the one-off detail of how shitty cops are at wearing masks properly.)

One last side note: I enjoyed screamsbeneath's review in general, but especially the mention of Vajra Chandrasekera's blog about Unbuddhism; it helped fix some of my ignorance of Sri Lanka to add context and depth to the book.