The Tower of the Swallow

***The Tower of the Swallow*** (UK) or ***The Tower of Swallows*** (U.S.) (Polish: *Wieża Jaskółki*), was written by Andrzej Sapkowski and was first published in Poland in 1997 and is the sixth book in *The Witcher* series and the fourth novel in the saga.

The U.S. edition was released by Orbit on 17 May 2016, with the first UK edition coming out a couple days later by Gollancz on 19 May 2016. The following year, the second UK edition came out on 9 March 2017.

## The Tower of the Swallow

### Publication date

17 May 2016 (U.S.)19 May 2016 (UK 1st ed.)9 March 2017 (UK 2nd ed.)

### No.of pages

464 (U.S.)448 (UK 1st ed.)464 (UK 2nd ed.)

### ISBN

978-0-316-27371-8 (U.S.)978-1-4732-1156-8 (UK 1st ed.)978-1-4732-1157-5 (UK 2nd ed.)

## Summary

One day, old Vysogota finds a very badly injured girl in the swamp surrounding his retreat. He saves her life and she tells him her story... the story of Ciri and how she became a cruel killer meeting death at every step. Until she met her retribution - Leo Bonhart, who killed her fellow bandits and captured her.

Meanwhile, Geralt is on his way to find Druids who might know where Ciri is. But someone is determined that the witcher should not find her...

Vysogota, an old philosopher living in the Pereplut swamp, finds an injured Ciri near his retreat and takes her in, caring for her until she is ready to continue her journey. She tells her life story to the old man: how all the Rats were killed by Leo Bonhart, all except for Ciri. As she readies herself to leave, she is convinced that both Geralt and Yennefer are dead. Based on this assumption, she leaves Vysogota to find Tor Zireael.

Meanwhile, Geralt meets an elf named Avallac'h who tells him about a prophecy connected with Ciri. He needs to find some druids who will reportedly know where Ciri is. Yennefer is trying to find Vilgefortz's hiding place, but it is no easy task.

## Translations

For reasons unknown, some of the translations have "Swallow" in its plural form in the title while the original, the Polish title is in singular form. Thus, the most correct translation would be "Tower of the Swallow" or "The Swallow's Tower". The mentioned swallow is a representation of a single person so it feels like a rather big error in translation. The error itself might be related to Polish language complexity; the word "Jaskółki" in itself is in a plural form, however in a phrase "Wieża Jaskółki" it is not, here it is in its 2nd (of 7) declination case.

* American English: *The Tower of Swallows*, translated by David French (Orbit, 2016)
* British English: *The Tower of the Swallow*, translated by David French (Gollancz, 2016)
* Bulgarian: *Вещерът: Кулата на лястовицата*, translated by Vasil Velchev (ИнфоДар, 2010)
* Czech: *Zaklínač VI. - Věž vlaštovky*, (Leonardo, Ostrava 1998)
* Dutch: "De Zwaluwentoren", translated by Theo Veenhof
* French: *La Tour de l'Hirondelle*, translated by Caroline Raszka-Dewez (Bragelonne, 2010)
* German: *Der Schwalbenturm*, (dtv, 2010)
* Hungarian: Vaják - Fecsketorony (PlayOn, 2017)
* Italian: *La Torre della Rondine*, translated by Raffaella Belletti (Nord, 2015)
* Lithuanian: *Kregždės bokštas*, (Eridanas, 2007)
* Russian: *Башня ласточки', (АСТ, 1999)*
* Slovak: *Zaklínač VI.: Veža lastovičky* translated by Karol Chmel (Plus, 2017)
* Spanish: *La torre de la golondrina*, (Alamut, 2011)
* Finnish: *Pääskytorni*, translated by Tapani Kärkkäinen (WSOY, 2015)
* Brazilian Portuguese: *A Torre da Andorinha*, translated by Olga Baginska-Shinzato (WMF Martins Fontes, 2016)
* Türkçe: *Kırlangıç Kulesi*, translated by Regaip Minareci (Pegasus Yayınları, 2019)