Did you start with the short stories? I could see that not being the best point for jumping in. I started with the first novel of the saga and then went to the shorts afterwards.I've played the first three Witcher games, and tried to read the first book but I couldn't get into for some reason. I really think maybe the translation from polish missed something. I don't really know, it just didn't grab me, so I dropped it since I had other books I was looking forward to. well, that's my story.