Amazon.co.uk:Customer reviews: The Lady of the Lake: Witcher 5 – Now a major Netflix show (The Witcher Book 7)

Top positive review

This rating is for the series as a whole.

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 11 January 2018

Absolutely gorgeous story-telling and world building abound through the five books.

At first I was a bit unsure of the narrative trick of introducing a random character e.g. a messenger and then from his point of view him recounting how he saw three villains killed by one of our heroes. Or a battle described partially from the combatants perspective and partly through a school history lesson years later. But what it does, aided by the brilliant writing, is really immerse you in the world. It’s second to none in making real the background to our heroes adventures.

And then there’s the fact that it’s smart, funny, sad, terrifying and overall uplifting.

There’s a lot of grey in peoples actions, both the good and the bad people and one of our heroes goes seriously astray for a while. And there’s also one of the best out and out bad guys you’ll encounter in fiction.

Throw in the fact that the author then manages to seamlessly blend his world in with some our more well known myths and legends and frankly you’ve got a near masterpiece.

Loved it unreservedly.

15 people found this helpful

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M. Barnes

Incomprehensible Rubbish (sliding scale)

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 6 July 2020

Having played all of the games and looking forward to what was the upcoming NetFlix series (at the time) I thought I would brush up on the Witcher Lore via the original books.

To be clear, I've now read every single book in the series from the short stories to the main story spread over the remaining 5 books. The short stories piece is a nice introduction in the world and gives you some intel around the additional lore than may have been missing from the games.

However, when moving onto the main story line the author seems fixated on providing an endless list of towns/locations/characters which have little or no bearing on the story to the point where you begin to lose track. This seems to get progressively worse with each book with some of the major story lines having vague or incomplete endings/reasons for being. For example geralt just happens to listen to some conversation "in a cave" via some "device" which drastically changes the outcome of the story.

I don't know whether or not this story was lost in translation from Polish to English but it is simply not worth the investment in time.

I am purely disappointed with the story and author for such a vague and tenuous storyline but also quite impressed how a video game producer managed to get something coherent out of it.

I would not recommend this series at all other than the first two short story books.

8 people found this helpful

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From United Kingdom

M. Barnes

Incomprehensible Rubbish (sliding scale)

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 6 July 2020

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8 people found this helpful

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M. King

This rating is for the series as a whole.

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 11 January 2018

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15 people found this helpful

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Alaran

The child of prophecy defies her destiny

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 18 June 2020

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This is probably one of the better Witcher books. As a final book in a series it is successful in tying up the various elements and drawing the saga to a satisfying conclusion.

The book delves into newish, but previously hinted at, territory by exploring a multiverse concept. This isn’t necessarily a major part of the overall plot, but it helps define Ciri’s role in the series and lightly touches upon some elements concerning the nature of storytelling.

It comes as a bit of a surprise that this propels the reader into our world for some segments of the novel, but considering the title and that the Witcher series has continually pillaged from various Northern European mythologies and folklore (‘Hans My Hedgehog’ perhaps being the most vital) it shouldn’t be that much of a shock.

By this point the character of Ciri has extensively developed and supplanted Geralt as the saga’s lead protagonist. She has gone through a ‘coming of age’ type plot. She has proved, at least to herself, that she is not merely the vessel that others consider her and found an identity. Established as ‘the Witcher girl’ it raises the question of whether the eponymous figure of the series might refer to her rather than Geralt. Likewise, the ‘lady’ of this book’s title could refer to more than one character.

There is, perhaps, a bit of a lack of Yennefer and Dandelion but the emphasis is clearly more on Ciri. Their roles and storylines are still reasonably satisfying, though.

‘The Lady of the Lake’ is considerably larger than the other Witcher books, even ‘The Tower of the Swallow’ which was substantially longer than the others. But whereas ‘The Tower of the Swallow’ squandered its greater length in convoluted, almost, retelling of events from differing perspectives, ‘The Lady of the Lake’ makes better use of it.

Thus, for example, we are able to see more about the decisive battle between Nilfgaard’s armies and the allied Nordling forces. Virtually all the main characters aren’t present at this and seeing it through the eyes of the young, naïve Jarre and those that deal with the wounded and the dying in the field hospital is an interesting angle.

A lot of the ‘final’ confrontations against the main antagonists of the series come considerably before the end of the novel. Perhaps, it ‘climaxes’ a little early, but this does leave a lot to deal with such as the war engulfing the land, the various power struggles and settlements and the fates of certain characters.

Overall, the series has wandered a bit at times and become a little convoluted with its perspectives and experiments in storytelling. This is, perhaps, not the conclusion that all readers/fans might want but it works and seems suitable.

4 people found this helpful

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M. Riis

Disappointed

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 12 February 2020

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This is difficult.. if you have made it this far in The Lady of the Lake I guess you - like me - actually think the core story in The Witcher series is good. Unfortunately a large part of it disappoint due to what appears to be a lack of a stringent editor or read through by a critical audience before publication. There are too many not-setting-the-scene-but-just-plainly-irrelevant parts and when we reach The Lady of the Lake it seems even the author has grown bored. I’d venture you could skip about 60% of the book and still have it all make perfect sense. What a disappointing turn for a story which could have been so good.

8 people found this helpful

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poisonfrog

Superb

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 26 January 2020

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I finished reading this set of five novels today and cried because I feel as though I've lost dear friends. Funny, sad, descriptive with some of the best characterisation I have read in an awfully long time. And, it has to be said, one of the funniest, non-icky sex scenes ever - I laughed like a drain. True brilliance.
Yep, there are times when the time-hopping can do your noodle but it creates a very interesting vehicle in a novel and I rather enjoyed the peculiarities and all the different POV.
All I'll add is, Cahir, Regis, Milva and Angeloume, may the earth rest lightly on you.

3 people found this helpful

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BillyDV

Epic Finale (well hopefully more on the way) to The Witcher series

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 5 December 2018

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After reading the 2 short stories, and the previous 4 main story novels (blood of elves, time of contempt, baptism of fire and tower of the swallow) this book and the whole series is filled with some of the best characters and story telling I've read. Even if you haven't played the games most notably The Witcher 3 you should still give these a read. Great, open and immersive world with complex and intriguing characters guaranteed to hook you. A great story of heroic fantasy at its best.

Would recommend

3 people found this helpful

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Jack McDonald

The arbitrary climax to a random and incoherent story

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 19 March 2021

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This review will cover the whole series, including the 2 short story anthology books and the prequel novella “Season of Storms”. I will be spoiling the books.

I had absolutely no idea what to expect when reading this series, I was so curious to see the surprises that were in store for me with this critically acclaimed series that was so popular. After reading the series, I would describe it as “the series where 3 characters who are shown to be destined to find each other frolic and galivant around until [Spoilers] they find each other. Oh and there’s also a big conflict between 2 large factions consisting of multiple kingdoms in the background that the author can’t decide whether it’s important to the plot or not.”

The 2 short story anthology books are actually quite enjoyable for the most part. They are clever twists on traditional folk tales, with a monster hunter protagonist and destiny overarching subplot. I was very interested to see what this author could do with a novel series.

It turns out that he should have kept to writing short stories.

Not only is the flow from chapter to chapter random and inconsistent, I get the impression that Sapkowski was just making up the plot as he was going along, with no clear plan. The books all end very abruptly, even the final one, I feel as though there could still be more books given how there are a number of plotlines mostly dismissed at the end. Occasionally the narrative is non-linear, which wouldn’t be an issue, if it weren’t for it being needlessly convoluted. It also gets really bogged down between the middle of “Time of Contempt” and maybe the end of “Tower of the Swallow”. Events that, in the short story novels, would happen offscreen and be mentioned in passing, are explored in excruciating detail in this boring snail’s pace segment of the books. There are clear issues with how the story is structured and I imagine that comes from Sapkowski’s clear DnD, make it up on the spot, approach to story telling.

Take for example, the introduction of a new main character at the start of book 3. In order to do this, Sapkowski sends a particular plotline back a few months to seemingly slightly retcon events of a chapter in book 2 in such a way that this character is offscreen, but present. We then shoot forward to the current timeline of this specific plot-line, which is actually months behind a different plot-line, to then reintroduce the character later on. Had Sapkowski known he wanted to introduce this character, he would have introduced her in book 2. There are a couple of examples of this and it is slightly frustrating. Had he just planned out the books and restructured events slightly, this wouldn’t be a problem.

On the topic of main characters, Sapkowski does them so dirty. Triss Merigold and Yennefer of Vengerberg specifically. I’m not sure if them being sorceresses made them hard to write conflict for, but Andrej seems to decide, after the first novel, neither have much of a role in the rest of the books. He finds various explanations for Yennefer, but Triss just decides she doesn’t want to do anything and sits on the sidelines for seemingly no reason. I could summarise her role in most of the series as “slightly concerned friend who is very sad but a bit too busy right now to deal with this” despite her incredibly strong introduction and personality.

I will cap off this review by pointing out how unsatisfying the final book actually is. After 4 books of build up, finally these characters will come back together for a final confrontation with the big baddie. Well, they do and many characters are killed off, which I like, but it is done in the “these side characters will slowly die off one by one in random but completely predictable ways” style. Not a single death felt upsetting or satisfying to me. It doesn’t help that they die from things that just don’t kill our main trio. There is an instance of a side character who gets killed quite bluntly by the evil dangerous swordsman. So how will our main character who isn’t as experienced as the guy who got killed escape from this threat? By the power of plot armour and using a trick that didn’t work against this evil character before, but for some reason now does because he needed to be killed. Or another instance, where the big villain kills an immortal vampire almost immediately after he joins the fight, but struggles to kill our 2 mortal main characters who have been fighting him for a while at this point. It’s just lazy writing to me.

Clearly these 2 main characters must be saved for their dramatic and vague deaths at the hands of peasants in an abrupt village brawl in the very final chapter. Are they dead? Aren’t they? I don’t think Sapkowski knows or cares, he just needed to wrap this shit up. It comes off as an attempt at a clever twist, but unintentionally presents itself as poor story telling.

I’ve seen this series praised for its deep theming and rich characters, but I find that, while interesting, the themes are very much surface level and the characters are fairly average. I can’t say I think of whiney yet maturing teenager, grizzled emotionless antihero or sassy sorceress when I think of unique characters. The characters serve their specific roles appropriately and that’s all I can say on that.

Overall, I’d say this series is bloated, inconsistent and really doesn’t know what to do with itself. I have no earthly idea why people hold this in such high regard, but if you enjoy this series, then that’s great! I certainly did not and I am a lot more apprehensive about starting new fantasy series because of this series. To end on a more positive note, I’d say that there is great story potential hidden in here, but the stuff that comes with it just brings it down so much for me.

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Anonymous

Good book, poor translation.

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 23 January 2021

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Overall it's a good book but the English translation is of a rather poor quality:
- The book is full of literal translations from the Polish language which often makes you guess the intended meaning.
- Lack of consistency: same words are translated differently in different parts of the book.
- Some translations are simply incorrect and include very fundamental phrases which are warned against at schools.
- Typos are quite common too.

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Amazon Customer

Long after everyone else....but the last book gives GOT season 8 a run for its money as worst fantasy series ending ever

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 12 September 2020

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Seriously, Camelot? Half the boom Ciri poncing about one horse doing Quantum Leap? The whole Nilfgaard conquest arc ended by a poorly described battle? Yennefer and Geralts ending is ridiculous. So many threads left unresolved.

This idiot sued the game maker for more royalties. He should have laid them for fixing his pathetic last volume.

Only Benioff, Weiss and fat lazy GRRM have let me down more on a fantasy story ending.

I really hope Netflix ignore this book in the series. And I hope the author chokes on his lawsuit settlment. This book is insulting bad.

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neonnev

Simply amazing!

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 25 June 2017

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The latest in the Witcher Geralts tales certainly lived up to each of the fantastic stories before it. Mr. Sapkowski is a genius. The translation by Mr French superb.

This novel will keep you flicking and turning the pages enthralled by the brilliance of the beautiful characters and world they reside. Follow them through the latest pitfalls and tribulations of their destiny, with an action packed extravaganza of twist and turns through out the novel. Highly recommend. But read the others in the series first, live the life of the Witcher from the beginning. Find yourself immersed in a classic of the fantasy fiction world.

3 people found this helpful

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