Review: Patrick Rothfuss’ Kingkiller Chronicles
I’m taking a stab at reviewing some books (sorry Reuben) because now that i’ve made it out of school, I have time to read again. EVERYONE wants to tell you about what books you have GOT to read right now (sorry Reuben), and it sucks to tell someone either you don’t want to read that book, or you didn’t like it – so I stumbled across NPR’s flow chart to navigating their top 100 fantasy / Sci fi book recommendations, and just started going through the chart to find something to read that hasn’t hit my shelf yet. I started with Patrick Rothfuss’ Kingkiller Chronicles. There are two books published in this 3 part series so far: The Name of the Wind, and The Wise Man’s Fear.
I won’t lie, I adored the Harry Potter novels, and they made me cry like a little girl. When the NPR flow chart gave me the option of “Precocious lads in schools of magic” of course I picked it up! What that little snippet doesn’t tell you is that the precocious hero is more like a emotionally battered and broken Harry Potter, and instead of starting at the cute kid age of 10, it’s the full hormone raging angry age of 15.
The Name of the Wind is a fun read as it’s presented as the true story behind the fables about the hero. He is telling supposedly the true story of his life to Chronicler, so the reader gets to hear the blow by blow story of what it is that really happened, what rumors started, and watch the reputation grow along with the adventures of our hero, Kvothe. There is the standard rough childhood making it by the skin of your teeth story, and introduction to the University (I picture if Hogwarts were more like the University of Washington Campus in Seattle).
Magic in the world that Rothfuss presents to us is less “crazy old man beats down a stick yelling ‘YOU SHALL NOT PASS’”, and more presented as a scientific endeavor where anyone could seemingly learn to wield it, if they wanted to go through the process of learning how. Our smart, precocious sometimes obnoxious hero wants to learn as much as he can to accomplish his agenda resulting from his MYSTERIOUS PAST. (That should be read in a scary spooky voice)
The writing… this is what sold me. We all like a good story, but if it’s painful to get through (*cough cough Game of Thrones cough cough*), what’s the point? Rothfuss is easy to read and yet feels as immersive as Tolkien – just without nearly so many songs. Okay there are a few songs, but nothing on the level of Bombadil. There is intrigue, humor and the interesting time travel for the readers of going back and forth from the story to the present time of when the story is being told. The ending felt a little abrupt, but was easily compensated for the fact that it lead right into the next book…
The Wise Man’s Fear, which i’m sorry to say – I was not fond of. I really REALLY enjoyed the name of the wind, and was very excited to pick up the next book in the series – but more on this later. The 2nd book in the series picks up right where the first left off. Our hero is making his way through the university, chasing his lady friend, exploring the world through his lessons and friends, and then INSERT BIG ADVENTURE HERE. I’m not saying that you have to keep the whole story line within the university – we know you’re not writing the next Harry Potter story, but you don’t have to keep going from adventure place to adventure place either. The foray into the courtly world of nobles was somewhat interesting, but the growing ego of the hero ran on my nerves. Maybe it was supposed to do that? but it wasn’t thrilling for me.
And then, there is the incredibly poorly written women. Book one had some women, but they were second string to setting up the complex world he was writing about. Now? They are painful to read. If they are not child like, then they are women who are preyed upon, need saving, or, bitter shrewish gossips, beings who live only for sex and to hear people talk about them, or lastly, my favorite – the super tough fighter but openly sexual women who are so backward they don’t understand how women become pregnant.
I liked the intrigue set up with the introduction of a great evil character that wasn’t wholly explored by the end of this book, but I won’t lie – i’m not going to rush out to grab book 3 after finishing A Wise Man’s Fear.
Overall, i’d say read The Name of the Wind – it’s a fun book that is easy to read and begs you to keep turning the pages to see what is next (better yet – get the audiobook read by Nick Podehl, he has a great voice for this!), and then judge for yourself if you want to read on in the series. Who knows, maybe we’ll all be pleasantly surprised by book 3 when it comes out?
