Author: Patrick Rothfuss
Genre: Fantasy
Length: 662 Pages (Hardback)
Publication: March 2007
My Rating: 4/5 Stars
Synopsis From Goodreads
Told in Kvothe's own
voice, this is the tale of the magically gifted young man who grows to
be the most notorious wizard his world has ever seen. The intimate
narrative of his childhood in a troupe of traveling players, his years
spent as a near-feral orphan in a crime-ridden city, his daringly brazen
yet successful bid to enter a legendary school of magic, and his life
as a fugitive after the murder of a king form a gripping coming-of-age
story unrivaled in recent literature. A high-action story written with a
poet's hand, The Name of the Wind is a masterpiece that will transport readers into the body and mind of a wizard.
Review
This novel was very hard for me to rate. I finally settled on four stars since I did enjoy this novel a lot. But there were certain aspects of it that I just didn't enjoy. So let's get to some of my thoughts.
First of all, I do really like Rothfuss' writing style. I don't think it's the most brilliant writing I've ever read, but it is quite beautiful in parts. The style of the novel is also interesting. I like how it's told as a story and that we get to see some wild exaggerations of that story during the interludes on occasion.
The main thing I would have liked more from this novel was characterization. I love character driven stories and I felt that this one was somewhat lacking. I did really like many of the characters, I just didn't feel there was quite enough done with them. Kvothe is the only one that I felt I got to know, and even that was marginal and clouded by his own perceptions of himself. His friends Sim and Wil were interesting, and he tried to give us insight into their personalities, and I loved their love and devotion to each other, but they just weren't there enough. I wanted more.
And Auri. I felt like she was kind of thrown in suddenly and then disappeared for chapters at a time just to reappear again. I thought she was fun and I'm interested to see where she goes in the story, I just think her being thrown in was kind of random. Yes, she had some important scenes, but why is she there?
The other characters I'm most interested in are Fela (I really wanted more with her and was hoping for much more than I got), Mola (again, I kind of expected more), and Elodin (he was hilarious and I would have loved more of his eccentricities). Denna was the only other character that got a lot of attention. She really frustrated me at first and I really didn't like her. She grew on me much more toward the end of the novel, although I still don't love her.
I'm really interested to see where the rest of the story goes. The pacing of this one was a bit slow for me and I honestly think that it could have easily been shortened, but overall it was interesting. More time within the school itself and with the Masters and other students would have been a nice touch. It kind of seemed like the story got lost in the middle and wandered for a bit before finally finding its way back to the main story.
There were a lot of interesting things in this novel and I often found myself intrigued by the story. For its length it was a fairly quick read. When I would sit down to read I was surprised by how much I would get through in just twenty or thirty minutes. The writing flows well, even in parts that I found poorly paced. For readers of fantasy this is a good one to try. I'm looking forward to seeing where the rest of the story goes.
There's honestly not a whole lot to say about the story. We are mostly inside Kvothe's head, reliving his life with him. We get to see what formed him into the legend that he currently is. We don't even really know what the legend is all about. At least not completely. I kind of like stories like that though. It gives me something to discover. I can form my opinions as I go. So I guess I will see what I think in the future books.
If you've read this let me know what you thought in the comments!
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