Blood of Elves (The Witcher #3)

Another return to The Witcher world and my excitement for the series unfortunately keeps ever so slowly petering out. Blood of Elves marks the switch from a short story format to a regular novel format and on that front it is a success. Without having to restrain himself to self contained stories, the author was really able to set up a more proper ongoing plot line and develop it progressively through the entire book. The pace at which this happens though is painfully slow.

The book starts off promising with chapters following Ciri’s training at Kaer Morhen, the (re)introduction of Triss Merigold, an adventurous trek with Geralt and some dwarves and it’s generally presenting a very enticing world state following the fall of Nilfgaard and exploring each character’s personality. Nevertheless whilst interesting the chapters remain quite slow, characters talk a lot which is fine whilst there are some interesting non dialogue heavy sections in between (Ciri’s training “montage” which is very well written, the slightly messy but still enjoyable attack on the dwarves) but the second half of the book forgets all about balance…and arguably even about Witchering. One chapters focuses solely on the leaders of the various kingdoms of this fantasy world discussing their next political move and it really is just them talking often going in circles and that for an hour-long chapter. This is then followed by chapters of Yennefer and Ciri getting to know each other which is again extremely talk heavy and new development poor.

That last point however could be seen as unfair as I am familiar with the video games, as such a lot of developments in this book are things I take for granted which does make for a more boring read than it should otherwise be. This doesn’t stop the pacing from being slow and the chapters from being extraordinarily long. Indeed, despite the switch away from short stories, a singular chapter still goes through a full narrative arc of a specific character; whilst there is continuity between chapters this time to help the plot development, the overall feeling of chapters trying to fit in a full story is still there.

Overall though, it’s fine and it’s a bit of a disappointing note to end on but Blood of Elves is just alright, it’s somehow still and again setting up a grander story which I’m curious about but I also know where the story is heading in the big lines as I’m familiar with the game related events taking place after all the books. So I’m not sure whether I’ll keep going with this, it’s a fine serviceable but a bit forgettable fantasy book and whilst serviceable but forgettable is something I’m perfectly happy with when it comes to romcoms, I’m not sure I can bear it when it comes to fantasy.