Reviews with content warning for Sexual violence - Die Dame vom See

Reviews tagging 'Sexual violence'

Die Dame vom See by Andrzej Sapkowski

22 reviews

pensandpicks's review against another edition

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adventurous mysterious medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

2.5

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tilo's review

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adventurous dark emotional mysterious sad tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.75

Der letzte Teil der Hauptreihe ist wie alle anderen Bücher in der Reihe genial. Der Anfang ist sehr kurios und ich war etwas skeptisch, aber der Subplot

mit Nimue und Condwiramurs

hat dann alles in ein spannendes Licht gerückt. Einige der Höhepunkte des Romans haben mich jedoch nicht so stark bewegt wie die Vorgänger, was einerseits daran lag, dass ich durch die Videospiele einer der größten Plottwists schon kannte und andererseits fand ich einige Momente sehr abgestumpft geschrieben und die Reaktionen der Charaktere haben mich teilweise verwundert. Das ist aber auf hohem Niveau angemerkt.
Das Ende ist sehr sonderbar. Man mag darüber denken, was man möchte, aber speziell zu diesem Teil hat es schon gepasst.

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aangi16's review against another edition

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adventurous dark tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

1.5

I wanted to like this series so much and I kept reserving judgement and thinking "maybe it'll get better after this book" but no it really is just that boring and flat.

I can appreciate that some things just weren't to my taste. For example, I'm sure other people enjoyed the overly complicated politics but personally I didn't care for it. But some things were just objectively bad, or at least questionable, decisions.

Like introducing a group of interesting characters (Regis, Milva, Angoulême) only to unceremoniously kill them all off in one of the laziest ways possible because they've served their purpose of getting Geralt to Ciri. Not to mention the reasons they each agree to help Geralt find Ciri in the first place are tenuous (don't even get me started on Cahir's reason/obsession with Ciri).

Character motivations were something I consistently struggled to understand throughout the series, but especially near the ending.

You're telling me Duny waged wars with nations and is responsible for the deaths of millions of humans, dwarves, elves etc because he wanted his offspring to rule the world but changed his mind at the last second because Ciri cried a little? And Geralt and Yennefer after finally getting her back were prepared to just let her go without a fight and kill themselves (after having sex first because of course) instead?

Other issues I had with the series as a whole:
- Why does every woman geralt comes across either fall in love with him or want to have sex with him? He's canonically unattractive and he doesn't have a very charming or likeable personality. 2 or 3 women sure, but not every single woman he has a conversation with
- Sapkowski's obsession with Ciri repeatedly either getting SA'd, almost SA'd, or being used as a breeding machine is weird and creepy
- The sex scenes were hilariously bad (I even read a couple passages to friends)
- The writing was terrible in some places (though this may be an issue with the translation, rather than Sapkowski himself)

Now for the good stuff:
- The books are actually quite funny in some places
- Geralt's crew in this book (Regis, Milva, Angoulême and Cahir) were interesting and fun and I wish we'd gotten to see more of them
- Ciri's character and story arch is really interesting, even more than Geralt's imo
- The world and lore are genuinely interesting and have a lot of potential (which is why I love the games and I'm looking forward to seeing what the show does)
- The characters have flaws and personalilty traits that make them feel more like real people (most of the time)
- I loved Ciri's relationships with Geralt, Yennefer, Triss and the other witchers

In summary, it wasn't worth reading the whole series just for the little nuggets of enjoyment I got every now and then, especially considering how disappointing I found the ending to be.

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