Houston Southard
a name that looks so fake you'll care just as little to learn it's not
Patrick Rothfuss - the name of the wind
It was night again. The keys of a laptop laid in wait to create a review, and it was a review of three parts.
The most obvious part was a full, echoing epic, made by the letters written on a page. If the words came to life they would've taken the form of a young man name Kvothe, eager to know the answers to life's greatest questions, thirsting for knowledge and power to avenge those taken from him. If the story were written in music, it would sound a sweet melody of a lute, plucked by gentle, sure, fingers. If the book had the power to transport, you'd find yourself in a world of magic, university lessons, traveling troupes, and dragons. The book contained more than all of these, so the review grew.
The second part was an aching need to see the story's mystery finally unraveled. The teeming yearn of waiting for the 3-day arc of the trilogy to come to a close, wondering what ruined the life of the thief, the poet, the academic, the magician, the romantic, the survivor, the warrior, the nomad, the philosopher, the king killer named Kvothe.
The third part was not an easy thing to notice. It was the weight of knowing whoever you were before reading it changed with the turn of each page. It was the smolder of trying to grasp how you'd ever lived before having this story intertwined with the ebb and flow of your own. It was the clunky hands of a man-child on his couch tapping away at the black keys under fingers that gleamed in the soft glow of blue light.
Patrick Rothfuss is maybe the most beautiful fantasy writer today. He's as tortured as his characters and it shows. He bleeds his words onto the page and it's made the Kingkiller Chronicles some of the most beloved books in the past two decades. When George R. R. Martin claims a book as the best epic fantasy he's read in years, you've got something special. You also know why he'll never finish Game of Thrones, because he's too busy doing testimonials.
It's been 15 years since the latest installment, and the suspense is reaching a head. Finish the series, Pat. Give us the name of the wind.