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The Name of the Wind Thread


wuzzup3003

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Heard a lot about this book before I picked it up. Kept my expectations low, but still, kind of underwhelmed. It irritated me that Kvothe doesn't really develop as a character. He's that old fantasy favourite -- the archetype orphan boy who becomes a hero. It's been flogged to death, and for all the crap that gets thrown its way, Harry Potter still did it better.

Good writer, boring book IMO.

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This is one of those books I passed on before because I didn't want to buy it. I recently checked it out from the library though, and liked it. Will read the next installment, but I don't feel a need to own it at this juncture.

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I recently read this one too, and I really enjoyed it. I liked both the frame story and the story being told.

What puzzles me though is that there seems to have been a fire at some point, and Kvothe rescued one of the girls, Fela? This I pieced together based on refrences to it during the book, but I just can't remember having read it! Either I must have been asleep when I read those pages or they must have fallen out of the book! But the thing is that I can't find the scene either, and I have been looking for it! Can somebody please help me, by either telling me where in the book it happened (page, chapter) or telling me what heppend in the scene? It would be a great help! :)

I'm looking greatly forward to the next book in the series, and learning the truths (or that is, the truths as Kvothe tells them) about the legends of Kvothe!

- E -

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I recently read this one too, and I really enjoyed it. I liked both the frame story and the story being told.

What puzzles me though is that there seems to have been a fire at some point, and Kvothe rescued one of the girls, Fela? This I pieced together based on refrences to it during the book, but I just can't remember having read it! Either I must have been asleep when I read those pages or they must have fallen out of the book! But the thing is that I can't find the scene either, and I have been looking for it! Can somebody please help me, by either telling me where in the book it happened (page, chapter) or telling me what heppend in the scene? It would be a great help! :)

I'm looking greatly forward to the next book in the series, and learning the truths (or that is, the truths as Kvothe tells them) about the legends of Kvothe!

- E -

I do not have the book with me, so I cannot tell you the chapter, but it happened when Kvothe was working in the lab. They had a new metallic chemical that was highly flammable and volatile. It leaked out of its container and caused a fire. Kvothe doused himelf with water, used a bit of his magic, and rescued Fela.

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I read this one a while ago, but didn't post my thoughts here, so I will now.

I was pretty thoroughly disappointed. Despite the mixed reactions to the book that most people on this board had, almost everyone seemed to be in agreement about the quality of the prose. Prose is pretty high on my list of priorities when reading. I'll forgive quite a few flaws for a properly turned phrase.

IMO, Rothfuss failed big time in this regard. Earlier in the thread, somebody said something like "the prose is not as good as it thinks it is." That sums up my feelings about it as well. He did show flashes of some pretty slick wordsmithery, don't get me wrong, but for the majority of the book, the prose just ends up stumbling clumsily over its own pretensions. I think what really killed it for me, is that in each fiction workshop I've been in, there's been at least one student writing the exact same way. Flashes of "oh, that was nice" mixed with way too many cringe-worthy "my god, you're trying too hard here" moments. That said, this is a problem that I expect to iron itself out as Rothfuss continues to write. He does show promise, and practice makes perfect and all that.

The other big problem I had with the book was Kvothe's characterization. Like many others, I felt the Gary Stu elements were way too much for me to handle. I lost my suspension of disbelief after Kvothe completely dismantled the scribe's cypher in about two minutes. Never really got it back.

The parts I enjoyed most about the book were some of the minor characters. Rothfuss does quirky very well. Scenes with Kvothe and the little underground girl or with the naming master were usually a genuine treat. Bast was an intriguing character, and if I do end up reading any of the following books, it'll be because I want to find out about him.

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Bah, he's not a Gary Stu, he's just multi-classed.

:P

J/k, I agree, but I can still enjoy a Gary Stu depending on other elements. I wonder if he'll be going the way of Dunnett's Lymond, who I still enjoyed, despite his rampant Gary Stun-ess.

Btw, I had a good laugh when he jumped off the roof thinking it was the way to apprenticeship. :lol:

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heh

I just realized I haven't even considered reading this since I confuse him with Ruckley. :) (I read the prologue of Winterbirth and had no desire to read on)

But given the mixed feelings, I think I'll go pick up Keyes again instead, since I hear the quadrology ended very well. I read Briar King, but never got around to continuing.

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I posted on this a few months ago but since the thread is alive again I'll throw my slightly-altered opinion in too.

The Name of The Wind is good, but it's not as good as the hype.

Yeah, I said it. Sure, Orson Scott Card and Robin Hobb gave it starred reviews but I've never read any of their work so their blurbs don't impress me. Now, GRRM's blurb on The Lies of Locke Lamora was one of the reasons I bought that.

TNotW has its strong points. Though Rothfuss does kill his prose now and then with those snarky little comments that totally pulls you out of the story, the rest of the action does keep you interested.

Where he really excels is world building and his minor characters. I found Devi (the teenage loan shark) and Auri (the girl living under the University's tunnels) to be the best characters in the book and I was actually more interested in them than our red-headed protagonist.

I will retract my Harry Potter comparisons since as someone said, Earthsea was set in a school of magic and it's not like HP was the first book series to ever use the trope. It was just poor timing for TNotW to come out three months before The Deathly Hallows. Well, not really...but the comparison will be made since Rowling has captured the brains of damn near everyone with those books. I could rant about Harry Potter later but this isn't the time or the place....

The only true gripe I have about the book is the lame ass ending. Spoilers below:

The whole Denna "Blue Wedding" thing felt cheap and tacked on. Then when you finally get there you're expecting one of the Chandrian to be there but no....a dragon is there. And how does Kvothe defeat the dragon? He feeds it drugs and then when it goes on a high-induced rampage Kvothe uses his magic to drop a big iron wheel off the roof of a chapel onto its head.

Then right after that the story ends and we get some lame ass final chapter with Bast (who I absolutely loathe) threatening Chronicler. The end.

Lastly, on a blog post from a few months ago Rothfuss talked about the delay in book 2 and said he DID add in some last minute things to Name of the Wind when it was accepted by DAW. The two big ones were the character of Devi (good idea) and the whole Draccus (dragon) scene at the end (bad idea.)

But what really gets me is his website and even the press releases say he wrote all three books while in college but it's still taking a two year delay between books 1 and 2, which are supposedly already written. Hmmm....Well, one year now since the book is expected in April 09 but still...

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IMO, Rothfuss failed big time in this regard. Earlier in the thread, somebody said something like "the prose is not as good as it thinks it is." That sums up my feelings about it as well. He did show flashes of some pretty slick wordsmithery, don't get me wrong, but for the majority of the book, the prose just ends up stumbling clumsily over its own pretensions. I think what really killed it for me, is that in each fiction workshop I've been in, there's been at least one student writing the exact same way. Flashes of "oh, that was nice" mixed with way too many cringe-worthy "my god, you're trying too hard here" moments. That said, this is a problem that I expect to iron itself out as Rothfuss continues to write. He does show promise, and practice makes perfect and all that.

I really, really liked his prose style. Anyhow can you please highlight this with an example ?

The other big problem I had with the book was Kvothe's characterization. Like many others, I felt the Gary Stu elements were way too much for me to handle. I lost my suspension of disbelief after Kvothe completely dismantled the scribe's cypher in about two minutes. Never really got it back.

Here is how i rationalize it. Rofthuss is writing about the greatest Magician that world has ever seen; that means Kovothe is one of the greatest geniuses his world has ever produced.

Do you think Newton, or Archimedes or Da Vinci wouldn't have seen through that cipher in minutes ?

I posted on this a few months ago but since the thread is alive again I'll throw my slightly-altered opinion in too.

The Name of The Wind is good, but it's not as good as the hype.

Maybe thats what killed it for you. When i first read it i had only seen two reviews written on it that said it was very good. Nothing ground breaking though.

As for the one year later thing Rofthuss tried to explain it away by saying he didn't get round to editing and stuff due to personal issues ( which are valid even from the most jaded points of view). It still pisses me off thoug. One of the major selling points for me was that the trillogy was already written and i would have to wait a year for installments.

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Secondly, some of the criticism on this board did confuse me.

Anachronisms exist in historical fiction, but not fantasy. I'm pretty sure they can't, due to the nature of fantasy (as opposed to reality). Complaining of anachronisms in fantasy is like admitting that one has too strong of pre-conceived notions of what a book should be. You can say that Rothfuss didn't follow the tropes of a typical fantasy novel, but I found that to be a strength rather than a weakness. Moreover, these complaints seem to miss the idea that it is a story within a story, Verbal Kint style.

Music-wise, I still say there isn't really an anachronism. Yes, there are a whole bunch of elements smashed together by an author who probably doesn't know what he's talking about, but those elements did and do exist, even if some of them weren't introduced to western music until the 18th century. The problem with the music - which, again, didn't actually bother me while I was reading it - is that advanced compositions aren't bar/tavern songs. Simpler music tends to dominate for a bunch of reasons. First, because one person playing the same bar for hours needs to know a lot of music, and because if he's there for more than a night, he can't play the same songs all the time. Simpler songs are easier to remember. Second, because drunk people like to sing along, or at least they like to hear a few songs they're familiar with.

However, this is something that I only noticed in hindsight. It's not a real criticism on my part since I didn't even think about it until that foliated fella brought it up.

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I posted this at FantasyBookSpot last year, but it feels relevant to some of the recent comments here about the book...

It's not an awful book by any means -- some of my disappointment is simply finding it to be a merely serviceable book after all the pre-release hype -- but it failed to really capture my imagination, it seemed too much an at-times awkward hodgepodge of familiar elements from other stories. I can see why many people would like the book -- in the same way the Harry Potter books do, it joins together so many favorite tropes of fantasy into a single story. It never worked for me, though, as single, powerful and coherent narrative: it felt less than the sum of its parts.

There was some good stuff in the book, to be sure. I thought the interactions between Kvothe's parents felt very true, and welcome, given how so many epics begin with the hero as an orphan; the suddenness of Kvothe's loss adds early emotional punch, and motivates the story in a non-traditionally personal and small-scale way that had me hoping for more. I also thought Rothfuss did a good job portraying something of the psychology of being poor throughout large parts of the novel -- and there are some good psychological elements in Kvothe's case of puppy love, too. But Name of the Wind was full of vague writing and needless repetition, Kvothe is in turn brilliant and stupid at rather convenient moments in the plotting (and it's 650 pages of nothing but Kvothe talking about himself, no secondary characters ever get fleshed out), the world-building and world "feel" are anachronistic, and the whole book seems allergic to showing key interpersonal dramatic moments in any detail. Save for one or two good conversations surrounding Denna towards the end of the book, it is always "we talked of everything and nothing." That's a good phrase to describe much of the book: I can see why the Tad Williams comparison gets made, although Name of the Wind often reminded me of Williams at the worst of his middle-volume doldrums. The story does pick up a bit in the last 100 pages, but I got the feeling that Rothfuss felt he needed to save his only two or three bullets until then, in which case writing a 650 page book was perhaps not the best idea.

I like the idea of epic fantasy and I've read a fair number of them: maybe that's why I recognized so many elements in the book from other sources. There may well be universal themes and conflicts, as Rothfuss suggested in his interview here at FBS, but I was disappointed by how few new representations of those universals he offers, how few new solutions. It sagged in that regard even compared to the notably derivative Codex Alera books by Jim Butcher, which also have a larger, more interesting cast of characters, better pacing, and greater resolution in each book of the series. And I never felt he did love of music better than McCaffrey, feral-child-in-the-city better than Hobb, a magic school better than Rowling, mysterious naming magic better than Le Guin, unreliable narration better than Wolfe, first-person storytelling better than Zelazny or Brust, etc.

What I also found hard to track about Rothfuss's book is the way it vacillates between romanticism and realism. There are bits of grittiness, seriousness and rationalism of the sort you'd never see in epic fantasy from the likes of David Eddings and his ilk, but then there are also cutesy and overdone elements (the recurring Dracus book, characters like Auri and Devi, how every woman Kvothe meets is beautiful) such that I never comfortably knew how much suspension of disbelief was being asked of me, and the vacillation between the two was forever kicking me out of the book. (Denna, whose presence I otherwise enjoyed, was almost the embodiment of this.) By the end I was pretty much just skimming to find out what happened, and that's death for a book that's so self-conscious about the act and the art of storytelling.

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I really, really liked his prose style. Anyhow can you please highlight this with an example ?

Sure. I doubt it's really going to do us any good, but whatever.

I should have been bolder and kissed her at the end. I should have been more cautious. I had talked too much. I had talked too little. (end of chapter)

I honestly can't get my sophomore level workshop out of my head when reading stuff like this. It just has an 'almost but not quite' feeling for me. But to be honest, I think my dislike of the prose may just be an extension of my dislike of Kvothe's character. It's so over the top and melodramatic. I think that if I were better able to believe in Kvothe as a character, to see him as a real person, I'd be more willing to buy into this prose. Since I can't imagine him as a real person, it's hard to imagine him feeling things this deeply (especially about his first love, especially, what twenty/thirty years after the fact).

Another problem I have is that Rothfuss tends to end his chapters this way -- with some kind of emotional punch. The problem with that is when you do it too many times, the punch starts to lose its power.

I doubt I'll read another of the books in this trilogy, but I'll definitely consider picking up a future work. After Kvothe and after Rothfuss has had some time to develop.

Here is how i rationalize it. Rofthuss is writing about the greatest Magician that world has ever seen; that means Kovothe is one of the greatest geniuses his world has ever produced.

Do you think Newton, or Archimedes or Da Vinci wouldn't have seen through that cipher in minutes ?

I honestly couldn't tell you, but I'll assume the answer you're looking for is 'yes'. Okay, sure. This Chronicler fellow appears to be the premier writer/journalist of his time, which, while probably not making him a 'genius', it definitely puts him up there. He's also been doing this for quite a while, I believe, and has had quite a bit of time to develop this cypher. But sure, Kvothe is one of the greatest geniuses of his world. Fair enough. Does that also mean he's one of the most gifted musicians of his world? A talented actor to boot? Good-looking enough to be oh so popular with the ladies? Witty enough to bandy words (and WIN at the bandying) with professors, fellow students, bar owners and loan sharks alike? Athletic enough to save a girl from a fire or save a town from a dragon? Kind-hearted enough to help the "what what hush hush" guy in Tarbean when he was able and take food to the underground girl at University?

Do you think Newton or Archimedes or da Vinci were all those things as well? It's just too much. And who knows, maybe Kvothe is more unreliable than I think he is, but from this book alone his character feels like the ultimate authorial insertion of superhuman self into story. Right down to the fucking hair color.

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The reason people compare the university segments to Harry Potter rather than Earthsea are for the following reasons:

* there is a snotty professor in Harry Potter, and the snotty professor in NOTW is strikingly similar in attitude and personality (until you get to know the HP professor better in the seventh book, anyway) - and no snotty professor in Earthsea at all

* there is a snotty well born fellow student in all three works, but the Earthsea snotty kid ends up dropping out of school (something which does not happen with the other two works)

* Ged only spends a couple of years at his school before earning his staff and moving on - this is not the case for Hogwarts or the school in NOTW, where students stay there a lot longer

* in the Earthsea school (Roke) the students only learn how to be mages - whereas Hogwarts and the school in NOTW teach a much larger variety of subjects, and have the feel more of high class elite boarding schools or even modern universities - the school at Roke has a much more homespun feel to it

Just out of curiosity - have the people wondering where the Hogwarts comparisons come from read the Harry Potter series? Because I really thought that the snotty professor and snotty fellow student in NOTW are near clones of Snape and Malfoy. And it did detract from NOTW for me.

Where it did not remind me of Roke at all.

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The reason people compare the university segments to Harry Potter rather than Earthsea are for the following reasons: [...]

There is an external argument as well. The last Harry Potter volume was released in 2007. It has earned the author and publisher a gazillion gold pieces. If you're in the business of publishing fantasy, 2007 is just the right year to release a new young adult series.

Along comes the Rothfuss manuscript. Young prodigy, some magic, everything PG-13, boarding school drama — it's perfect. And Rothfuss can actually write, which Rowling certainly couldn't in the beginning. So you buy it, package it, and use all your marketing skills to make it take off. Including letting Rothfuss agent, Bialer "reveal" that Betsy Wollheim, Daw Books' president, considered the novel the best fantasy debut she's ever read in over 30 years as an editor. Woohoo!

That's where the Harry Potter comparison comes from, at least for me. The whole genre wants a new HP, and Rothfuss fits.

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The reason people compare the university segments to Harry Potter rather than Earthsea are for the following reasons:

* there is a snotty professor in Harry Potter, and the snotty professor in NOTW is strikingly similar in attitude and personality (until you get to know the HP professor better in the seventh book, anyway) - and no snotty professor in Earthsea at all

* there is a snotty well born fellow student in all three works, but the Earthsea snotty kid ends up dropping out of school (something which does not happen with the other two works)

* Ged only spends a couple of years at his school before earning his staff and moving on - this is not the case for Hogwarts or the school in NOTW, where students stay there a lot longer

* in the Earthsea school (Roke) the students only learn how to be mages - whereas Hogwarts and the school in NOTW teach a much larger variety of subjects, and have the feel more of high class elite boarding schools or even modern universities - the school at Roke has a much more homespun feel to it

Just out of curiosity - have the people wondering where the Hogwarts comparisons come from read the Harry Potter series? Because I really thought that the snotty professor and snotty fellow student in NOTW are near clones of Snape and Malfoy. And it did detract from NOTW for me.

Where it did not remind me of Roke at all.

I admit I haven't read Harry Potter, apart from part of the first one many years ago. I also haven't read Goosebumps, Pokemon, or the Berenstein Bears. Part of what galls me about the comparison is that I think people cut the Harry Potter books slack and allow them to suck because they're "children's books." That being said, you do raise some good points about the comparisons between HP and TNOTW. I can see many of the comparison you make being true, in particular the antagonistic professor.

However, the fact that the foil student drops out in Earthsea doesn't indicate which series is a match, as we don't know the ultimate fate of Ambrose just yet. And the fact that Ged flies through Roke seems more to me like Kvothe than harry potter, who comes back for a new "grade" every year doesn't he?

Also, there are also similarities that Earthsea and Wind share as well. As far as I know, none of these things are true of hairy potter.

Both protags have their entire family/village/life wiped out by enemies.

Both have a wizard mentor early in their career that quickly fades away.

Both advance in school more quickly than fellow students, earning some jealousy.

Both go on to become the most powerful wizard in the world.

Both of their magic rely on the true names of things.

Perhaps most imporantly of all, both protags have pride as their biggest flaw.

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I admit I haven't read Harry Potter, apart from part of the first one many years ago. I also haven't read Goosebumps, Pokemon, or the Berenstein Bears. Part of what galls me about the comparison is that I think people cut the Harry Potter books slack and allow them to suck because they're "children's books." That being said, you do raise some good points about the comparisons between HP and TNOTW. I can see many of the comparison you make being true, in particular the antagonistic professor.

However, the fact that the foil student drops out in Earthsea doesn't indicate which series is a match, as we don't know the ultimate fate of Ambrose just yet. And the fact that Ged flies through Roke seems more to me like Kvothe than harry potter, who comes back for a new "grade" every year doesn't he?

Also, there are also similarities that Earthsea and Wind share as well. As far as I know, none of these things are true of hairy potter.

Both protags have their entire family/village/life wiped out by enemies.

Both have a wizard mentor early in their career that quickly fades away.

Both advance in school more quickly than fellow students, earning some jealousy.

Both go on to become the most powerful wizard in the world.

Both of their magic rely on the true names of things.

Perhaps most imporantly of all, both protags have pride as their biggest flaw.

That's why they're called archetypes. Hell, Neil Gaiman brushed off any criticism that JK Rowling stole from his earlier comic series Books of Magic series stating that its very common in tales for young magicians to have pet familiars, and owls even more so. (although the physical resemblance between illustrations of Harry and Tim Hunter is striking).

And I would hesitate to compare Harry Potter to Pokemon, Berenstein Bears, and Goosebumps and saying that they're allowed to suck.

I find the HP series to be a fun read. I also enjoy things from Dostoevsky to Jhumpa Lahiri to GRRM. Just because its children's lit, it shouldn't get slagged either.

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