The Witcher Series

The Last Wish (1)

Summary

The Last Wish contains seven short stories interspersed within a frame story: Geralt of Rivia is resting within a temple after being severely injured undoing the curse of King Foltest’s daughter who has become a striga.

The Witcher, the first story, concerns Geralt taking on a contract to reverse the curse that has been placed on Foltest’s daughter, who was born as result of an incestuous relationship with his sister, turning her into a striga who now terrorizes the town. The story ends with Geralt in Melitele’s temple.

The second story, The Lesser Evil, Geralt arrives in Blaviken seeking a reward after killing a kikimora. The town’s alderman has no interest in giving Geralt a reward for killing the monster, but does point him in the direction of the local wizard who might have use of the monster’s innards. Geralt recognizes the wizard as Stegobor, after which the wizard tells him he is being pursued and he needs Geralt’s help. Geralt says he won’t kill this pursuer, as he doesn’t want to choose between two evils. Eventually, Geralt encounters this pursuer, called Renfri. Renfri lies about leaving town and Geralt realizes she is going to massacre the people of Blaviken to draw out Stegobor. Geralt goes to the marketplace to stop it and ends up killing all of Renfri’s men. This earns him the pejorative of the “Butcher of Blaviken” and an expulsion from the town.

Next up is The Edge of the World, where we meet Dandelion, the bard. Geralt is looking for work, and a local town has a sylvan, a rare and intelligent creature, causing mischief. Geralt encounters the creature, who is working on behalf of the elves, and is tied up and almost killed by Filavandrel, a leader of the elves, before he is bailed out by the Queen of the Fields.

In The Last Wish, Geralt and Dandelion fish up a djinn’s bottle. The djinn does some serious damage to Dandelions throat and vocal chords, a near death sentence for a bard, forcing Geralt to seek out immediate aid. This leads him to a local sorceress, Yennefer of Vengerberg, who offers help, but secretly wants to capture the djinn to harness its immense power. Things go poorly, and Geralt realizes that he, not Dandelion, is the master of the djinn, and in an effort to release the djinn before it kills Yennefer, who he is in love with, he wishes their fates bound to each other in order to save Yennefer.

In the final story, The Voice of Reason, which is the framing story and is interspersed throughout, Geralt and Dandelion are getting expelled from the temple. He embarrasses a knight’s guard who challenges him to a duel in which Geralt is instructed not to hit the knight with his sword. Geralt parries so forcefully the knight hits himself with his own sword, and Geralt leaves unscathed.

Thoughts

I’ve always heard mixed reviews for the Witcher source material. Some claim the writing is mostly dialogue, and ham-handed at that. Some claim it is the weakest within the big trifecta of Witcher material between the television show and the video games. My first exposure to this universe was via the video games, then the television show, and finally, the books, starting with The Last Wish. I haven’t read any of the other books, so my thoughts are reserved to this first book in the series.

It’s hard to judge the book on its sole merits. I have two fully realized visions of Geralt across the video game and television show. I can hear his metallic gravel voice in my head when I read his lines. You can’t help but triangulate this source material with those other dominant forms of media. I’ve put in over 100 hours with the video games, and another 20 or so with the show, and what I can say about the book is that it is enriching that experience. I really enjoy this universe, the writing generally keeps out of the way, and it has the sort of appeal of a Knights of the Round Table type of mythopoetics that makes its generally transparent plots breeze by. Geralt is Lancelot via Grimm’s Fairy Tales, and if you are looking for a light read and enjoy this universe, these books are worth a perusal; fast, easy, and really shades the margins of the video game and television show.