First of all I want to say that this book was well worth the wait! The first book was wonderful and had me chomping at the bit waiting for the second and Rothfuss delivers! The second book in the Kingkiller Chronicles is even better than the first (if that’s even possible)!
As always, Pat’s writing style is smooth and a delight to the senses. Almost as if Kvothe were singing the story with lute in strum. Like the Adem he wastes no words here. Every line of the book is purposeful and telling. I have read many books with more filler than plot and that is not something that you are going to find here!
The other point I want to try to get across to my readers is how this book made me feel. I am certainly not a writer of the caliber of Rothfuss (or Kvothe) but please let me try to endear you to this incredible and enchanting book. As I was listening to Kvothe tell Chronicler the story of himself and all the tales within tales I couldn’t help but feel that I knew these stories. I had the strangest feeling that I had heard them before, like they had been written on my heart from a young age. Probably a bad analogy, but I seemed to recall them in memory like childhood bible stories. It was as if those stories of the Fae and Amyr and of old magics had been with me always. Of course, logically I know this is the first time I’d read them but it didn’t feel that way. The same of the characters. Even though it had been near two years since reading the first book I felt that these were old friends, long lost aquaintances come to call. I think this is perhaps the highest compliment that I can offer the author – that his story resonates with me somewhere deep, it’s not something I will forget. This series is destined to become ‘ficstorical’… meaning you will someday talk about the people, places and stories within as if they were historical fact and be amused at anyone who doesn’t know the references. (Something like the way most of us today talk about Frodo or Anakin.) On a lighter note, I couldn’t help thinking to myself that Pat would be a far better author to base a religion on than Hubbard. But I digress.
This the kind of story that you simply can’t put down until you turn the last page. And then you’ll find yourself breathless in anticipation of the rest of the tale. I pray to Merciful Tehlu the final book is sooner to pint than the last!
