My English "The Last Wish" review *Contains Spoilers*
The Last Wish….”The last time!”Firstly let me explain a bit about my background. I am a huge Fantasy fan, I read it, I role-play it (old school, yes with pencils) and I PC game it, its in my blood. So you can imagine my excitement when I discovered a whole new world, namely that of the ‘Witcher’. Not only I was told I could read about this dark character, I could soon PC game in his world too…..excellent.Well without any hesitation I rushed to Amazon, and saw that the Book “The Last Wish” was for sale and had only recently been translated into my beloved English. I read, was impressed by the readers reviews and clicked to buy. 2 days later, the book was on my doorstep. I admired the cover lovingly as it bears a strong resemblance to a gaming cover, mock ancient tome like, with tattered pages. Nice!Now comes the review and my overall impression…“A European Superstar” The book proudly proclaims “Delicious twists of originality” it goes on..“Unforgettable & unputdownable!”.....wellWell indeed….. *Spoiler, so dont read on if you want to read this book *To my utter dismay the book starts out with Geralt the main character entering a sleepy town, he sidles into a rundown bar (sound familiar?) orders a drink and is then singled out by some unruly patrons. Now at this stage I though….”Have I picked up a Western by mistake….surely an original writing genius wouldn’t use the trusted ‘Trouble in the Inn routine’ ” I read on.Yes you guessed it “We don’t like your sort here” the troublemakers exclaim. ”Oh no” I thought, “the oldest cliché in the world….wasn’t this in Star Wars too?”. Now I may be picky here but surely an original writer could come up with a better start to a book than this, I paused, shook my head and read on….It transpires quickly that Geralt kills all three with a swish, bang and fizz! The city Guard arrive to see the three locals writhing in a pool of their own blood and a white haired hippie with a huge sword. Groan, “here we go” I thought, “Come along with us sir!” sigh. The sad fact is this sequence of events has happened a million times, in a million books and in a million RPG games. Delicious twists of originality hah, my left foot! Oh did I tell you he gets of scot-free….reason? Unknown really I am still confused at that bit. I read on….Anyway this event brings me onto the next black mark against this book, namely the translation….its bloody awful. Whether the Polish version flows seamlessly or not, the English version is disjointed and on a few occasions the sentences are just plain wrong. Get a better translator next time….This now leads me onto the plots and characters, weak and poor… The plots are child like and the characterisation is amateur. Main characters that by rights should stand out, become an endless line of ranting, sometimes babbling fools (with attitude). Some attempt at being dark, full of intrigue but end up inevitably talking nonsense for 3 or 4 pages. Names, places and events fly from the page like machine gun bullets, and without a Map or any context it ends up being dribble, that sadly you have to trawl through to get to action. Action thats leads us nicely to Geralt our hero or anti-hero.Geralt, what a strange one he is….oh and yes, like all good cliched fantasy hero’s, he is the reluctant Hero. Nobody understands me; I don’t understand myself….why? why? Yawn. I have never met such a non-dark and non-mysterious, dark and mysterious hero ever before. His ability with the sword is without question, but his constant doubts and naivety at times is totally contrary to the impression I got from his fans. Two occasions in the book highlight his lack of any common sense and end up causing him problems. One with the Striga girl, after a right royal punch up he only attempts to lean over the still, batter body….yes you guess it “Shes pretending she’s out cold you bloody fool”. Guess what? Our seasoned, mutant, monster killing machine does lean over and gets his throat slit for the trouble (clever boy). “Who can we get to look down this barrel to see if this cannon is loaded….I know Geralt the wise” Another occasion that proves Geralt’s complete naivety is the incident with Shrike, the homicidal, gnome f**king, brigand princess who is out to kill this Wizard. Again in some ridiculous plot Geralt finds himself reluctantly defending a wizard (who hates him) and a town (that don’t like him) from this mad Bitch. After the classic love/hate conversation with her, she sneaks into his bedroom…a bit of flirting and again more rambling she agrees to leave. “Yeah right” I hear you saying, but hold on everyone, Geralt believes her, and it isn’t until his friend reminds him the next morning shes a mass murderer that it twigs, she may be dishonest too. This whole event then plays out with the classic punch up in a stall filled market, she dies and the Wizard is still bloody ungrateful.Groan…shakes head!Sadly I tried, with every will in my body to read on. I even got to the Dark knight with the Spiky armour, that refuses to take off his visor at the banquet but it got all too much, the book was closed for the last time…..I have read Tolkien, Feist, Moorcock, Brooks, Gemmell, Lawhead, Williams and many more….but I have never come across a book that was so disappointing in everyway. Its cliché’s, its unoriginality, its lack of depth or believability was so evident. The only element I got out of the book was the very real feeling that I had been robbed paying £9.99 for a book that is in essence empty.[Edited for clarity]
The Last Wish….”The last time!”Firstly let me explain a bit about my background. I am a huge Fantasy fan, I read it, I role-play it (old school, yes with pencils) and I PC game it, its in my blood. So you can imagine my excitement when I discovered a whole new world, namely that of the ‘Witcher’. Not only I was told I could read about this dark character, I could soon PC game in his world too…..excellent.Well without any hesitation I rushed to Amazon, and saw that the Book “The Last Wish” was for sale and had only recently been translated into my beloved English. I read, was impressed by the readers reviews and clicked to buy. 2 days later, the book was on my doorstep. I admired the cover lovingly as it bears a strong resemblance to a gaming cover, mock ancient tome like, with tattered pages. Nice!Now comes the review and my overall impression…“A European Superstar” The book proudly proclaims “Delicious twists of originality” it goes on..“Unforgettable & unputdownable!”.....wellWell indeed….. *Spoiler, so dont read on if you want to read this book *To my utter dismay the book starts out with Geralt the main character entering a sleepy town, he sidles into a rundown bar (sound familiar?) orders a drink and is then singled out by some unruly patrons. Now at this stage I though….”Have I picked up a Western by mistake….surely an original writing genius wouldn’t use the trusted ‘Trouble in the Inn routine’ ” I read on.Yes you guessed it “We don’t like your sort here” the troublemakers exclaim. ”Oh no” I thought, “the oldest cliché in the world….wasn’t this in Star Wars too?”. Now I may be picky here but surely an original writer could come up with a better start to a book than this, I paused, shook my head and read on….It transpires quickly that Geralt kills all three with a swish, bang and fizz! The city Guard arrive to see the three locals writhing in a pool of their own blood and a white haired hippie with a huge sword. Groan, “here we go” I thought, “Come along with us sir!” sigh. The sad fact is this sequence of events has happened a million times, in a million books and in a million RPG games. Delicious twists of originality hah, my left foot! Oh did I tell you he gets of scot-free….reason? Unknown really I am still confused at that bit. I read on….Anyway this event brings me onto the next black mark against this book, namely the translation….its bloody awful. Whether the Polish version flows seamlessly or not, the English version is disjointed and on a few occasions the sentences are just plain wrong. Get a better translator next time….This now leads me onto the plots and characters, weak and poor… The plots are child like and the characterisation is amateur. Main characters that by rights should stand out, become an endless line of ranting, sometimes babbling fools (with attitude). Some attempt at being dark, full of intrigue but end up inevitably talking nonsense for 3 or 4 pages. Names, places and events fly from the page like machine gun bullets, and without a Map or any context it ends up being dribble, that sadly you have to trawl through to get to action. Action thats leads us nicely to Geralt our hero or anti-hero.Geralt, what a strange one he is….oh and yes, like all good cliched fantasy hero’s, he is the reluctant Hero. Nobody understands me; I don’t understand myself….why? why? Yawn. I have never met such a non-dark and non-mysterious, dark and mysterious hero ever before. His ability with the sword is without question, but his constant doubts and naivety at times is totally contrary to the impression I got from his fans. Two occasions in the book highlight his lack of any common sense and end up causing him problems. One with the Striga girl, after a right royal punch up he only attempts to lean over the still, batter body….yes you guess it “Shes pretending she’s out cold you bloody fool”. Guess what? Our seasoned, mutant, monster killing machine does lean over and gets his throat slit for the trouble (clever boy). “Who can we get to look down this barrel to see if this cannon is loaded….I know Geralt the wise” Another occasion that proves Geralt’s complete naivety is the incident with Shrike, the homicidal, gnome f**king, brigand princess who is out to kill this Wizard. Again in some ridiculous plot Geralt finds himself reluctantly defending a wizard (who hates him) and a town (that don’t like him) from this mad Bitch. After the classic love/hate conversation with her, she sneaks into his bedroom…a bit of flirting and again more rambling she agrees to leave. “Yeah right” I hear you saying, but hold on everyone, Geralt believes her, and it isn’t until his friend reminds him the next morning shes a mass murderer that it twigs, she may be dishonest too. This whole event then plays out with the classic punch up in a stall filled market, she dies and the Wizard is still bloody ungrateful.Groan…shakes head!Sadly I tried, with every will in my body to read on. I even got to the Dark knight with the Spiky armour, that refuses to take off his visor at the banquet but it got all too much, the book was closed for the last time…..I have read Tolkien, Feist, Moorcock, Brooks, Gemmell, Lawhead, Williams and many more….but I have never come across a book that was so disappointing in everyway. Its cliché’s, its unoriginality, its lack of depth or believability was so evident. The only element I got out of the book was the very real feeling that I had been robbed paying £9.99 for a book that is in essence empty.[Edited for clarity]