The Witcher saga: the five novels

The Witcher saga is the five novel sequence at the centre of Sapkowski's work: Blood of Elves, The Time of Contempt, Baptism of Fire, The Tower of Swallows and The Lady of the Lake. Ciri, the child of destiny introduced in the stories, becomes the saga's true protagonist as war between Nilfgaard and the Northern Kingdoms closes around her and every power in the world, human, elven and other, reaches for her bloodline.

The current US editions are Orbit's new edition trade paperbacks of July 5, 2022, and their ISBNs run in a satisfying sequence: Blood of Elves 9780316452663, The Time of Contempt 9780316452762, Baptism of Fire 9780316452861, The Tower of Swallows 9780316452960 and The Lady of the Lake 9780316453066. The five are also sold together as the Saga boxed set, 9780316498845. Earlier Orbit paperbacks exist for each title and are recorded in the census edition notes; a 2022 hardcover run also exists, with Blood of Elves at 9780316453363.

Title care is needed at the saga's end. Orbit's US title is The Tower of Swallows, plural, while Gollancz's UK edition is The Tower of the Swallow, singular, UK paperback 9781473231115. Similarly the US book is The Time of Contempt where the UK form drops the article. Same texts, different title pages, and a reliable way to tell a US from a UK copy in a listing photo.

Japanese editions are verified for four of the five: Blood of Elves 9784150205935, Baptism of Fire 9784150205997, The Tower of the Swallow 9784150206062 and The Lady of the Lake 9784150206079, all Hayakawa Bunko FT. Time of Contempt's Japanese edition exists but its ISBN was not retrieved in this pass and is left blank honestly rather than filled from a secondary list.

Read as one long novel, the saga is the work the games and the screen adaptations both draw on most heavily, and the five matching Orbit paperbacks are the standard modern shelf form of it.