I'll be honest: despite what I say, there are times to buy the book at the front of Barnes and Noble. If I were the kind of snob who read only Hugo Award winners, I'd have no idea what anybody else is reading and thinking. You can argue that I have no idea anyway, but at least now that's irrelevant to what's popular.The Name of the Wind is all about Kvothe (pronounced nearly the same as "quothe" (that's what the dust jacket says, but most of us who aren't Edgar Allen Poe have to think twice anyway)), a mysterious innkeeper who turns out to have a legendary past. Kvothe is discovered by an enthusiastic Chronicler who persuades him to tell his memoir in three days (one day for each book of the series). The Name of the Wind details his origins, beginning as the son of traveling players, continuing through his days as a homeless teenager in the big city, and concluding with his escapades at the University. At every turn, Kvothe is forced to make great sacrifices in order to pursue love and magical knowledge, but frequently he is pressed into choosing one over the other.
I'll start with something this book does right. For me, the best feature of the story is the stylistic completeness of the world in which Kvothe has adventures. Rothfuss is not shy about getting technical with anything, not just including magic: he explores politics, economics, music, archiving, metalworking, organized crime, dendrology–you name it. As someone without a Ph.D. in Everything, I didn't feel equipped to question the accuracy of his explanations, which did a good job of convincing me they were true. At the least, they were consistent with each other within the world of the story, which is all I needed to enjoy it.
The biggest problem with the book is Kvothe. It's blatantly obvious that Rothfuss wanted to make a cool character and designed the rest of the story around him. This is fine and even common, as seen in Beowulf, A Wizard of Earthsea, and everything in between. But Superman needs kryptonite to make his adventures a challenge, and a fantasy hero needs some kind of character flaw other than, darn it all, being just too awesome for his own good. This is a description that isn't convincing, and unfortunately, Rothfuss applies it to Kvothe. Kvothe is the best musician in the world, the best magician, the smartest... it gets tiresome. I think his studies in the University actually are leading him to a Ph.D. in Everything. He's the center of attention even when he's not narrating, and he doesn't seem to mind, which automatically makes me dislike him.
On a lesser note, I couldn't buy into the University, either. Academia is a useful place, but it's so unlikely to be a teach-all in your fantasy kingdom that I found it to be the most unrealistic part of the story. It's blatantly modeled after a modern American university. Good fantasy does more than translate something as a one-to-one symbol; it creates something new to explore a variant possibility grounded in human sense.
In spite of all this, the plot is quite good, and I'm looking forward to reading the sequel. Rothfuss doesn't mess around with useless anecdotes. Every detail is relevant, and he leaves hanging threads in a way that the sequel will be able to pick them up. The climactic action scene is really a culmination of most of the stuff that happens previously in the book. And the villain behind the scenes seems like he will be very solid when he appears again.
Read this book! For a popular interpretation of the fantasy hero, it's pretty good, if not genius.
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