Review: The Name of the Wind ~ by Patrick Rothfuss

“Words are pale shadows of forgotten names. As names have power, words have power. Words can light fires in the minds of men. Words can wring tears from the hardest hearts.”

I am not that type of a guy who reads books recommended by friends, mostly because I am highly critical of their tastes and generally don’t agree upon certain generic viewpoints when approaching fantasy books. But when my friend insisted that I read this book, and that it would change my life; who knew I was in for a treat.

When I first read the summary written behind the book cover; I fell in love with this book. The summary was probably one of the most badass summaries I have ever read in a book, it practically blew my mind. The summary basically gives us an introduction to the protagonist and his legendary exploits, how he has stolen princesses, burnt entire towns, talked to gods, loved women and written songs. Reading the summary already made me anticipate the book so much that I ordered it immediately (I am a more of a digitally-read kina of a guy, also *the best decision in my life*).

The book quickly made it to the top of my fantasy book list, it was simply magical; from worldbuilding to the magic system everything was well thought, planned out and exquisitely executed. The book is mainly in first person i.e., a kind of a autobiography where kvothe tells us his tale. This method of telling us the story as anecdotes through the protagonist was nothing short of genius. The story revolves around kvothe, and tells us about his life beginning from his childhood, this includes his exploits and incredulous feats of cunningness and shrewdness. The magic involved is a more academic oriented than I would have preferred, but it was still amazing to see kvothe figure things out and use them in a very unique fashion.

We do see a lot of common tropes in this book, kvothe is orphaned when the Chandrian kills off his parents and his entire circus troop. Then he manages to survive as a beggar on the streets, and then somehow managing to get into the University without having any formal education. Although this does dampen the mood somewhat this is far surpassed by the sheer effect of the fabulous worldbuilding the author has managed to pull off. Talking about the author…………… this guy is the most multitalented writer I have ever seen. Even reading the first few pages of the book can make you acknowledge that his flow and the touch with language is second to none. His written work is a joy to read and the flow with which he continues to narrate the story is simply something I can only dream of. Even as a standalone book this is one of the finest pieces of fantasy literature I have ever read.

The thing that I liked the most about the book were the little poems he had inserted in between the already steaming plot line. The poems were a joy to read, as I have said this book was badass the minute, I saw it but the poems really struck a chord with me. Although I have seen the usage of poems in many more fantasy books like LOTR and books by Neil Gaiman, but the short poems in this book were the most memorable. Some of them are still stuck in my head because of how badass they sound.

The author has really done a great job while writing this and there are so little faults his flow of prose and story plotline that it was and will be a joy for every book lover to read.

Happy reading!!