A review of The Name of the Wind

I know, this book was all the rave last year. Why am I only getting to reading it now?

Because.

And that’s the entirety of my excuse. Now do you want a review or not? H’okay then.

To start off with, I actually scoured Patrick Rothfuss’ website and blog well before delving into the book. The guy is a lot of fun to read in a casual setting, and I get the feeling he’d be great to meet and talk with, which would be a cool thing, should it ever happen. So, personality-wise, I was already liking the author before I cracked the pages of The Name of the Wind.

When I handed the book to a friend and they took the time to read the book flap copy and author bio, they then handed it back with the comment, “Dude, that’s whack.”

Yes. It is quite whack.

The Name of the Wind was a book with which I became instantly comfortable, and by that, I don’t mean it is full of fantasy cliche or I knew everything that was going to happen. It just means it was a good, solid fantasy story which I loved reading from one cover to t’other. There was never a rough, boring stretch of unnecessary exposition, dubious character motivation or clunky worldbuilding. It all fit, each page made me want to read the next, and I began to hate the thing known as “real life” that got in the way of precious tome-scanning time.

If you’ve seen it on the shelf, you will know this is a big book. Clocking in at 662 pages, it took me just about a week to read, using subway trips, lunch breaks, and yes, bathroom breaks. Let’s not fool ourselves, we all do it. But the pages are there for a reason, and it’s because this is a story about one extraordinary life.

The Name of the Wind is the story of Kvothe, as told by Kvothe, a most intriguing figure, who we start out seeing as an innkeeper with obvious secrets lurking in the shadows of his inn (sometimes literally).

Numerous times throughout the story, Rothfuss does have the opportunity to lapse into fantasy trope with seemingly familiar happenings and character types that you might think you’ve read somewhere else; but thankfully he surprises each time with a twist of events that managed to catch me completely by surprise. The magic of his world isn’t entirely original, and seems to link together a number of different systems that you will have seen before, but the technical workings of it are so thoroughly thought out, with the promise of more secrets and power to be revealed as the story goes on, that the level of subtlety and intricacy is impressive and refreshing.

Rothfuss’ bio promises that while this is his first book, “there will be more.” Kvothe tells the person who is writing down his story that it will take three days to tell fully, and with all the necessary details. This book is labeled Day 1, so do the math. Personally, I can’t wait. And neither should you wait as long as I did to get this story and devour it.

I see that smile.