marinaxanna's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
2.0
Spoiler
Oh and not to mention more vile, completely unnecessary SA scenes/tropes for Ciri. Seriously what the fuck was up with that Gramps BS?Spoiler
Mila, Regis and Cahir deserved better. And I mean that as in, their deaths were incredibly underwhelming, with happening in the same 4/5 pages apart and with the bare minimum of impact. I didn’t even take it seriously. They went from all OP/skilled to dropping like flies in the last book.Well, so did I—Almost dnf. Reading this was just not enjoyable for me at all. I forced myself to finish it since its the last part. Skipped the entirety of chapter 7 when it was clear it was another senseless subplot with Men Being Men TM with a bunch of characters i would never read about again. Seriously, who needs so many detours and timejumps to shape a plot????
Graphic: War, Rape, Sexual assault, Body horror, Emotional abuse, Injury/Injury detail, Misogyny, and Physical abuse
Moderate: Incest
green_amaryllis's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
3.0
Graphic: Violence, Torture, War, Death, Blood, Confinement, and Murder
Moderate: Xenophobia, Suicide attempt, Drug use, Kidnapping, Sexism, Incest, and Vomit
Minor: Pandemic/Epidemic
starsfall's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
Graphic: Rape, Alcohol, Xenophobia, War, Violence, Torture, Suicide attempt, Sexual violence, Sexual harassment, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexism, Self harm, Racism, Murder, Misogyny, Injury/Injury detail, Gore, Death of parent, and Colonisation
Moderate: Pedophilia
Okay wow this book was a lot. There were many plottwist that left me quite confused. I really loved how there were so mant different povs, so many characters. Although sometimes I was a bit lost with so many names and places.Spoiler
So that's that, the end of the witcher series, in hindsight I should have read season of storms after this one but i'll just reread the epilogue now. The ending kinda broke me, I feel like it was incredibly sad and depressing. And I know that the whole mood of the series should have indicated that there wasn't gonna be a perfect happily ever but still, I was a bit dissapointed. So many characters died.camoo3032's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.0
Graphic: Violence, War, Xenophobia, Gore, Rape, Sexism, Racism, Sexual violence, Slavery, Torture, Confinement, Murder, Death, Sexual assault, Blood, Fire/Fire injury, Medical trauma, and Suicide attempt
Moderate: Abortion, Drug use, Incest, Infidelity, Physical abuse, Vomit, Animal death, Pregnancy, Sexual harassment, Suicide, Alcohol, Classism, Misogyny, and Sexual content
Minor: Alcoholism, Infertility, Homophobia, Kidnapping, Cursing, Slavery, Child abuse, Child death, Colonisation, Death of parent, Excrement, and Bullying
geordirr's review
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
0.25
Graphic: Rape, War, Sexual violence, Blood, Adult/minor relationship, and Sexual assault
Moderate: Misogyny
Minor: Incest and Antisemitism
Spoiler
if you haven’t figured it out by now the entire plot of the series revolves around the attempted forced impregnation of a teenage girl by multiple parties. It’s particularly bad in this book as we get to read graphic descriptions of people attempting violent physical rape, coercive rape and medical rape on Ciri. Oh and one of the last things yennifer does before dying is to call Triss a slut for sleeping with Geralt back in book 3karenbo's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
2.75
Graphic: War
Moderate: Rape and Incest
efsimpkin's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
I do need to say though that as a Merlin fan I really enjoyed all the Camelot references, lol.
In the middle of the book is where the plot starts to pick up and Sapkowski’s writing shines once more. There’s a chapter that uses multiple POVs to describe a battle scene and it’s masterful. Throughout, we get thrown between times and places with only scraps of information to tell us where we are but it is perfectly executed. The use of a recurring motif (I won’t spoil what it is) hit me like a tonne of bricks when I worked out what it was doing. The use of sometimes very simple dialogue or clever word games is brilliant and even more brilliant when you consider that it survived translation, so well done to French as well for his work there.
This is by far the darkest and saddest book in the series, I feel, and I think that’s what makes it beautiful in its own way. I spent the whole book wondering how it would align with the characters I know from TW3, and I only got that answer right at the end, which was excellent. I had been lightly spoiled for the ending previously which is a shame but I still deeply enjoyed the book.
I’m going to wait a good long while, until I’m feeling nostalgic, to read Season of Storms.
Graphic: Rape, Sexual assault, War, and Death
Moderate: Incest
Minor: Pregnancy
saltylane's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
I didn’t necessarily expect a happy ending for everyone… But at least an ending that actually had conclusions that really mattered or that made sense would’ve been nice.
Overall, I rather enjoyed the series, despite its many flaws. With the switching perspectives, it did get confusing as to what was going on and what character was doing what. It often went to characters that I wasn’t really sure why they were even included… Unless they were just trying to close up plot lines? I don’t know; they didn’t really matter. It didn’t really seem very important that So-and-So died in such a way or succeeded in XYZ. Sure, sometimes it was nice to see what older characters that we hadn’t seen in a while were doing… But overall it wasn’t really important to the plot what was going on in their lives.
The reader for this audiobook is very talented! He really knows how to manipulate his voice to the different characters and stick with it consistently. The voice acting was also very good with emphasized emotions relevant to the scenes.
I’m really interested in seeing how the series on Netflix adapts all of the storylines. Hopefully it’s a little bit less convoluted…
Graphic: Child death, Death, Gore, Sexual content, Body horror, Violence, Blood, and War
Moderate: Drug abuse, Fire/Fire injury, Confinement, Drug use, Genocide, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Racism, Torture, Xenophobia, Medical trauma, Rape, Sexual violence, Alcohol, and Grief
Minor: Pregnancy, Self harm, Colonisation, Animal death, Classism, Fire/Fire injury, Infidelity, Homophobia, Incest, Medical content, Excrement, Adult/minor relationship, Panic attacks/disorders, Pedophilia, Sexism, and Vomit
knkoch's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
5.0
The changing storyteller aspect (telling parts of the story from later points in time, looking back, and/or from a distant storyteller) was occasionally irritating, as it felt like a way to slow down the most compelling parts of the narrative. But overall, it finally felt more appropriate to have so many narratives to jump between, as the many characters were better established by this point. By the final half, this reminded me strongly of The Lord of the Rings trilogy in the way several disparate groups or characters are working in different parts of the world during an enormous war. A nice fellowship developed here, too.
I’ve still got Season of Storms left, and then I’ll be all through with Witcher books! For awhile, at least. But I’ve thoroughly enjoyed them and will be sad to turn that final page.
Graphic: War and Violence
Moderate: Sexual assault and Xenophobia
hellbender's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? N/A
4.0
Spoiler
big 👍🏼 for the chapter where ciri jumps between worlds; that was great. big 👎🏼 for all the times Ciri almost gets raped and exploitedGraphic: War and Rape