It's way better in Polish.

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>>25321240
I thought the short stories were good. I was less sold on the main narrative and didn't finish.

But since you're interested in speculative fiction, I am curious Anon, have you heard the Good News? The greatest fantasy writer of all time has already arrived and delivered us from slopdom. Indeed, he has arisen in our time!

So, could I interest you in a word about our Most Holy Aspect Author and Warrior Poet, R. Scott Bakker?

>>25321258
Based on how much goodreads seem to hate him i'll give it a go - thanks!

>>25321240
I only read the English translation of the first book, the short story collection. Very fun, I enjoyed the throughline with Geralt's character arc, but I had no interest in continuing whatsoever. Maybe the rest suck, I dunno.

>>25321240
They're good until it starts being more about Ciri than Geralt which I believe is just after Blood of Elves.

>>25321291
i thought it was more around The Tower of the Swallow. But I also quite liked Ciri's sections then.
Baptism of Fire I think is the weakest one. A whole lot of trudging through a forest.

Also I was an idiot and read the "1" book first, instead of the short stories. How stupid right? Why would anybody think the number 1 book was the one to start with?

>>25321240
It's fine. Nothing crazy. Sapkowski was reading your classic fantasy, a lot of Moorecock, Geralt is not the first outsider character of gray morality

>>25321240
They are bad, really really bad. However I make my high school students read them so they read something and they enjoy it (we read the first book of short stories), so it deserves praise for that.

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>>25321627
>really really bad.
Who's bad?

>>25321240
I read a few years ago and it was slightly below WoT quality. Pretty slopulicious.

>>25321240
I read the first two books of short stories and they were straight up embarrassing. Look, man, I'm going to lay it straight for you, you may take me or whoever says this about this book for being a pretentious cunt but the reality of it is that these are knucklehead ass books filled with pedestrian prose, cringy dialogue, the very cool badass tough guy oc beating everybody's ass, about a million descriptions of boobs everywhere and the exact same subversion of "what if le monster good and society le evil?" in every story.

If you think you can still go "FUCK YEA, THAT SOUNDS AWESUM" remember this trash is delivered to you through a text that seems described by an out of breath fat kid telling you his tough guy fantasies. This is something Millhouse from the simpsons would write.

>>25321735
You sold it to me, anon. I'm ordering the books.

>>25321240
no, the game is better

It's not good but it's just kinda comfy, a bit like 90s TV like Xena or something. Like it's obviously not serious storytelling but you can sort of enjoy it anyway.

>>25321240
the description of battle in the last book was great and the short stories were good as well, with my favorite being Geralt meeting his mother
overall it's worth a read, why the hell not

>>25322867
What exactly is the difference between good literature and comfy? That it's generally in somewhat fantastic and extreme situations, compared to a book that looks directly at slice of life?
I'm not really sure how to tell 'literary' from not, except for the more mundane situations. And I'm not sure it matters much anyway, as either way, if the characters are well written, they have emotional stimuli and respond to it. If I think of the books that stuck in my thoughts for a while or changed me, I can't see much of a correlation. Some of the genreslop books made me think (Throne of Glass), some didn't, (many) some literary books did, (A day in the life of Ivan Denisovich) some didn't (White Nights). If there's enough substance in it, I kinda think it's luck of the draw whether it hits a vein I'm interested in.

ACOTAR deserves a special mention because while it did make me think, I was thinking about how it managed to be so retarded.

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>>25321267
Truth shines.

>>25322989
You're right that literary is a meme and plenty of genre fiction is better than literary fiction. The distinction I'm drawing is that Witcher's characters don't prompt emotional investment and its themes don't enrich your understanding of yourself or the world, everything about it is predictable, uncomplicated, and done before. But the little adventures are fun enough, so it isn't tedious autism like Sanderson.

>>25321240
I read the first book and it was dreadful. Nothing but poorly written pastiches. It had a single story that had potential, but aside from that it's not worth reading.

>>25323113
And the first one is the best one...eugh

>>25323113
I want to add that I don't believe the excuses of "you just read it in the wrong translation, in X language it's much better!"

The English translation reads like stilted, third rate prose, but supposedly the Dutch translation is much better. It still reads like stilted, third rate prose. But wait, supposedly the German translation is much, much better. And yet again, stilted, third rate prose. And a final time we hear 'but wait, in the original language it's much better because Polish is such a nuanced and complicated language that wouldn't translate into literally any other language'. Except when you track down reviews from Polish readers it turns out, yep, stilted third rate prose.

>>25321353
I don't think Geralt does anything that would make him fall under gray morality, he's like the archetypical errant knight in wolf's clothing.

>>25321240
They're serviceable as long as you're not expecting Melville quality like this cunt >>25323113 >>25323237. They're fun, grimdark fantasy books, slightly pulp, with the hypermasculinity of the setting. The first two books (the short stories) are the best; I'd recommend reading the rest only if you REALLY liked the setting, and beware, the author got sick of it about the third book in.

>>25321240
No.
Maybe the first one, but even then the tv show does it better sans the diversity.

>>25323399
>they are good as long as you don't expect them to be good
How pathetic consumers are.

>>25323569
>I must only experience the apex of every medium
retard

>>25323399
>just turn your brain off bro
>it's fun with friends bro

>>25321240
The short stories are good, but the Ciri saga is so fucking bad it's like parody of itself and gets progressively worse towards the end, like Sapkowsky is openly mocking his readers. Of course, slop fans will eat up anything, so he's not wrong

>>25321240
To echo others - short stories are great as they are mostly based on folktales.
>>25323272
>I don't think Geralt does anything that would make him fall under gray morality
My memory is foggy, but Sapkowski does love doing triangles where two of the parties end up being douche-bags and Geralt - a beaten wife. So I agree with you, I guess.

>>25321240
I read the prequel and the first 2 books and enjoyed it a lot.
I heard a lot of bad things about the other books, so I didn't even try them (I got too much to read).
At the very least, try the prequel and the first 2 books, specially if you enjoyed the games or plan to play them.

>>25322993
kek

>>25323745
>slop fans will eat up anything, so he's not wrong
i know what you mean, it's wild how shitty the standards are for fantasy/sci fi these days. thats true everywhere, books, games, movies, etc

>>25325963
That reminds me, the last couple times I went into a bookstore they had barely any space for the classics. It's all fantasy/scifi, thriller/crime, romantasy and contemporary politics you see on the shelves. If you actually want to read something decent, you have to order it online.

I think as people get less and less exposure to good writing, the standards will continue to drop.

>>25321240
It has some interesting ideas, but the serial of Geralt and Ciri's journey is just not very good in my opinion. If you're curious, take ten minutes to read one or two of the short stories in the first book.

>>25326682
>interesting ideas

Such as?

>>25321735
>This is something Millhouse from the simpsons would write.
This has unironically sold me on it.

>>25326665
>thriller/crime
God this is the worst slop genre by an absolutely enormous margin and I fully blame boomers who spent too much time watching detective shows where the detective never bothers themself with trivialities like collecting evidence.

>>25327132
>the worst slop genre
Worse than romantasy?

>>25327883
NTA but the few Lee Child novels I've read were easily worse than any fantasy book

>>25323569
>>25323704
>you must only read high art and nothing else