Genres: Fiction, Fantasy
They say, writers should write what they love and Patrick Rothfuss seems to do so. He love stories. Telling them is one thing but to live and tell them is astonishing. And how a writer can live in the stories?… By his imagination. Imagination is infinite. You certainly don’t have to pay for it. It is legal to use. And it’s the best thing a human has got, I believe. The Name of the Wind . At first, I never wanted to read it. But then, when strongly recommended by one of my friend, I borrowed his copy and read it. Now I can say, I can’t wait to read the second. The Name of the Wind introduce us to Kvothe, a figure which is hard to ignore not because he has red hair but because the mysterious intelligence the character has.
At the start level, the book is slow for a few pages, and it took me sometime to adjust. May be I was reading after a long time. But after reading the book, I read the starting few pages again. And I must say the style used by Patrick keeps things as simple as possible and he tries to create an enclosure by his words such that if a reader is immerse in his words, he will find hard to emerge out back to reality. The book, I must say, after reading 50-70 pages is very hard to put down. Though they say, the start and the end defines a book, I must correct them, ‘their’ saying might work for a story or a novella for they are short in length but for 600 plus page novel like The Name of the Wind you need to give it some time and at least 50-70 pages might be sufficient to start being judgmental about the book. Most of the times this will work for fantasies as they happen to be a bit bulky in the length.
As I said the story will bind you from it roots and you will be immersed in the world of Kvothe. The culture, the geography ,the background of the story and especially my favorite part, the characters, which are developed at such a level that they won’t disappoint the reader. According to one interview, Rothfuss spent 14 years in developing this trilogy and I don’t know the truth, nor am I being judgmental here.
So I would recommend this book, but then you might end up reading the trilogy.
3.5 out of 5 from me.
Patrick Rothfuss is one of my favorite authors of all times. I agree that it takes a while to be drawn into the book but once it happened, I couldn’t put it down. I read this book and The Wise Man’s Fear in under a week, which seemed like an accomplishment, given the size of the books and the fact that I had 3 kids under three to care for.
What I really like about Rothfuss is the homage he pays to the craft of writing. I think a lot of contemporary writers have forsaken the “art” of writing. Rothfuss does an amazing job with both storytelling and with his writing style. This is why, after just reading 2 of his books, I put him right alongside Neil Gaiman and Kurt Vonnegut on my list of best authors of all time.
I agree with you, he really pays attention to the ‘art of writing’. Nowadays hardly few authors pay attention to writing. That’s why I mostly prefer authors who are dead like of 18th 19th and early 20th century. A lot of them have their own style and enigma about writing. That’s what writing is about I guess, apart from a good plot and structure, a writer should have his won style. I can’t wait to read” The Wise Man’s Fear”, and I am planning to finish it by the end of this week 🙂
Mayhap you have already, but if you liked The Name of the Wind, you might also like Assassin’s Apprentice by Robin Hobb. The title sounds unpromising, I know, but the two have very similar approaches to the fantasy genre–deeply character-driven, finely detailed, and emotionally riveting. I thought Assassin’s Apprentice was even better than The Name of the Wind, and, if you haven’t read it, I highly recommend it.
Thanks for the recommendation, I will surely try it 🙂