Cameron Recommends: The Name of the Wind

Oh man, it's time for another blog post, and surprise, surprise it's another book review. So let's get down to it.

My little brother Chandler is great, he is a bookworm like me (though he doesn't read as much as me). He read this book (not sure who recommended it to him) and he loved it. He talked it up for a while and then two years back he got the paperback for me for my birthday. I was in the middle of another book so it took me a while to get to this one. The first 50 pages or so I was skeptical, I wasn't really sure what was going on. Then it took off and Oh how I LOVE this book.

One of the things that makes this book so fantastic is the writing style. There are essentially two stories going on, the present day and the past. In the present day an innkeeper is living with is assistant in a little town. Weird stuff is going down in the world but nobody really knows why. A biographer, known simply as "The Chronicler" shows up and reveals that he has figured out that this innocent innkeeper is actually Kvothe, hero, lover and kingkiller. He begs for the chance to tell his story and Kvothe agrees to tell it to him over the next three days. This section of the book is all told from 3rd person limited point of view.

Then we get Kvothe's story. Book one, The Name of the Wind, is the first day of Kvothe relating his tale. Man is it interesting. This section of the book is told from a first person point of view. He tells of his parents and how he grew up as essentially part of a mobile theater group that would pass from town to town and perform. Then tragedy hits and he spends time as a street vagabond in a large city, then he goes to "The University" where artisans and magicians learn their craft. This is NOT at all like Harry Potter though, this school is very different, not everyone can perform "magic" and magic is very limited in its abilities (essentially it's all about transfer of heat and energy, which appealed to my scientific mind).

The book is mostly this past story, but it is broken up a bit, with the third person limited point of view in the present being inserted here and there, like during the lunch rush at the inn or when a stranger comes knocking. The breaks make you excited to get back to the next section of the book, whether it be craving to know what is going on in the present or wanting to know what is going to happen to Kvothe in the past.

The book is beautiful, the writing is superb, and the story is compelling. I LOVED THIS BOOK. I would probably put it (along with its sequel, A Wise Man's Fear) in my top 5 favorites of all time. I'm eagerly (and yes impatiently) waiting for the third day to come out. So go pick this one up, it's well worth your time.

Thanks for reading, let me know what you think in the comments. Are these recommendations useful? Have you read this book? If so, what did you think?

Lots o' Love