Reviews with content warning for Grief - Ведьмак. Меч Предназначения

loved this. enjoyed it more than the first collection of short stories, but there’s clearly bias there because this book finally introduced ciri & yennefer was much more prevalent in these stories than in the other ones. also….mermaids!

there’s more weird fantasy misogyny in this one though. I just sigh and ignore it at this point, you really can’t escape it in this genre at all

Content Warnings

mattiedancer's review against another edition

Go to review page

adventurous dark tense medium-paced

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

4.75

Writing: 4.25⭐️/5

Much of this novel is beautifully written. I think I saved maybe 10-20 quotes throughout the book and that was without looking too hard for gorgeous passages. I do, however, draw an issue with some of the more misogynistic passages. I understand this is a part of the worldbuilding and is often used to demonstrate the bleakness of the world in which the characters live. However, these passages are often used in lieu of more interesting worldbuilding. I don’t really see the point of passively mentioning how a maid is getting SA’d and Geralt is annoyed by it. It just felt kind of lazy, but a laziness that was pretending to be clever.

Characters: 4.5⭐️/5

As far as well-written, thought-out, and developed characters go, it doesn’t get a lot of complaints from me. I would argue that several of the female characters relied heavily on tropes/stereotypes, which was a bit tiring at times as a reader given the depth of other characters. That being said, all the main characters were extremely well-fleshed out, which I really enjoyed reading.

Plot: 4.5⭐️/5

The short story format fit the material well. I found most of the plots just stunningly engaging and honestly really enjoyable. It was intriguing the way Sapkowski played off fairy tales in an entirely dark way. I really enjoyed it. This is what made it so confusing when he seemed to go out of his way to include a misogynistic side plot.

Post-Reading Rating: 4.5⭐️/5

Thoroughly enjoyable.

Who Should Read This?

Fans of Game of Thrones
Fans of bleak fantasy worlds
Fans of the Witcher show/game

CW: Sexual abuse, mentions of rape, sexual assault, murder, death

Final Rating: 4.75⭐️/5

Content Warnings

bronbaewr's review against another edition

Go to review page

adventurous emotional reflective medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Loveable characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.25

one of the most philosophical of the witcher books, it can be a bit easy to get lost in.

Content Warnings

frankynstein's review against another edition

Go to review page

adventurous emotional reflective sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

This installment has a much more sombre tone than The Last Wish. Many of the short stories were utterly heart-wrenching, especially the ending of "A Little Sacrifice" and the final story, "Something More". The latter is also the one I found the netflix series was most true to (it's corresponding episode is the season 1 finale "Much More").

Content Warnings

chronographia's review against another edition

Go to review page

adventurous dark emotional hopeful mysterious tense medium-paced

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

4.0

Content Warnings

More...