The Last Wish, by Andrzej Sapkowski
Geralt is a Witcher, able to hunt any pesky supernatural creature by magical means. He’ll rid any town of their monsters for a price. But not every creature is evil. Some are only cursed. Geralt must use his magical abilities and wisdom to discern the good from the evil.
The Last Wish reads like a collection of short stories, where Geralt moves from town to town, hired to rid each area of monsters. Many of the quests that Geralt embarks upon will seem familiar, as they become new twists to old fairy tales.
Each tale is fresh and suspenseful. Geralt is an interesting and mysterious character. I wish we could have looked more into his past. Immediately, Geralt reminded me of Van Helsing, but with magic at his command. With a variety of mythical and original supernatural creatures, this was an exciting book of fantasy adventure and dark fairy tales.
As far as I know, Last Wish is a collection of short stories, but the book is still on my to-read pile, alas 🙂
It’s a bit different than just a collection of short stories though, as some flow into the next and several characters overlap.
Reminded me a bit of Nightwatch. You might like that one if you liked Last Wish.
It is a collection of short stories – they were originally published independently in the Polish “Fantastyka” magazine. When they were published in a book, Sapkowski added “The Voice of Reason” framing story to connect them better. The Witcher series of actual novels doesn’t start until “Blood of Elves”, which will be published in English in September.