The Tower of Swallows by Andrzej Sapkowski

If you can read them, go ahead, but they aren’t considered canon and likely won’t have anything to do with Netflix’s show or the games.Interestingly, “The Road to No Return” short (about Geralt’s mother), which is the only Wiedzmín story missing from the Last Wish short story collection, appears in the 2000 collection Something Ends, Something Begins, which is a name some gamers might recognize from the similarly titled quest at the end of The Witcher 3. There are two anthologies consisting of Witcher stories penned by guest authors in Sapkowski’s world that were published in 20, but they’re in Polish. Those are the eight books in The Witcher series - in English, at least. If you’re the type of person who worries about spoilers though, save it for the end and enjoy it as a retrospective piece. If you’re dying to read the series in strictly chronological terms, it could be worth reading it right after The Last Wish. However, it’s also written after the saga was completed by Sapkowski and contains slight hints about what’s to come, if not outright spoilers. Originally published in 2013 - 14 years after Sapkowski wrapped the saga - Season of Storms contains stories that take place between the stories in The Last Wish, which aren’t necessarily in strict proximity to one another.

If you’re somebody who likes to know everything that happens as it happens, then you might want to read Season of Storms immediately after The Last Wish. Here are the five novels in order: Blood of Elves This is where the bulk of Geralt’s stories unfold, and makes up the main constituent of The Witcher universe at large - at least in terms of Sapkowski’s conception of it. However, if you want to know the ins and outs of the world and ensure that you’re a true Witcher connoisseur, you’ll want to dive deeper into the saga, which is set roughly 10 years before the games and focuses largely on the relationship between Geralt and Ciri. They also introduce a range of characters that don’t appear in CD Projekt Red’s adaptations, most of whom are great.If you’re solely interested in covering what’s likely to be featured early on in the TV series, the Last Wish and Sword of Destiny short story collections should be fine. This is comprised of five novels, all of which tell the stories of Geralt, Ciri, Yennefer, Triss, Dandelion, and others. Once you’ve read The Last Wish and Sword of Destiny, you’re ready to move on to the saga.

It’s basically a prequel collection written to prep you for Sword of Destiny. The Last Wish takes almost every single story from Wiedzmín and adds more, all of which feature events that occur before the previously published Sword of Destiny. The Last Wish is your starting point in The Witcher, which is important to note because it was published a year after 1992’s Sword of Destiny.

The Tower of Swallows by Andrzej Sapkowski