The Name of the Wind

"No one writes about stories like Pat Rothfuss. How the right story at the right time can change the world, how the teller can shape a life." --Lin-Manuel Miranda This deluxe, illustrated edition celebrates the New York Times -bestselling series, The Kingkiller Chronicle--a masterful epic fantasy saga that has inspired readers worldwide. This anniversary hardcover includes more than 50 pages of extra content! • Beautiful, iconic cover by artist Sam Weber and designer Paul Buckley • Gorgeous, never-before-seen illustrations by artist Dan Dos Santos • Detailed and updated world map by artist Nate Taylor • Brand-new author’s note • Appendix detailing calendar system and currencies • Pronunciation guide of names and places DAY ONE: THE NAME OF THE WIND My name is Kvothe. I have stolen princesses back from sleeping barrow kings. I burned down the town of Trebon. I have spent the night with Felurian and left with both my sanity and my life. I was expelled from the University at a younger age than most people are allowed in. I tread paths by moonlight that others fear to speak of during day. I have talked to Gods, loved women, and written songs that make the minstrels weep. You may have heard of me. So begins a tale unequaled in fantasy literature--the story of a hero told in his own voice. It is a tale of sorrow, a tale of survival, a tale of one man’s search for meaning in his universe, and how that search, and the indomitable will that drove it, gave birth to a legend. Praise for The Kingkiller Chronicle: “The best epic fantasy I read last year.... He’s bloody good, this Rothfuss guy.” -- George R. R. Martin , New York Times -bestselling author of A Song of Ice and Fire “Rothfuss has real talent, and his tale of Kvothe is deep and intricate and wondrous.” -- Terry Brooks , New York Times -bestselling author of Shannara "It is a rare and great pleasure to find a fantasist writing...with true music in the words." -- Ursula K. Le Guin , award-winning author of Earthsea "The characters are real and the magic is true.” -- Robin Hobb , New York Times -bestselling author of Assassin’s Apprentice "Masterful.... There is a beauty to Pat's writing that defies description." -- Brandon Sanderson , New York Times -bestselling author of Mistborn ...

ldquo;Rothfuss’* *Kingkiller books are among the most read and re-read in our home. It’s a world you want to spend lifetimes in, as his many fans will attest.”
—Lin-Manuel Miranda, Pulitzer Prize-winning creator of Hamilton

“The best epic fantasy I read last year.... He’s bloody good, this Rothfuss guy.”
—George R. R. Martin, New York Times-bestselling author of A Song of Ice and Fire
 
“Rothfuss has real talent, and his tale of Kvothe is deep and intricate and wondrous.”
—Terry Brooks, New York Times-bestselling author of Shannara
 
"It is a rare and great pleasure to find a fantasist writing...with true music in the words."
—Ursula K. LeGuin, award-winning author of Earthsea
 
"The characters are real and the magic is true.”
—Robin Hobb, New York Times-bestselling author of Assassin’s Apprentice
 
"Masterful.... There is a beauty to Pat's writing that defies description."
—Brandon Sanderson, New York Times-bestselling author of Mistborn
 
“[Makes] you think he's inventing the genre, instead of reinventing it.”
—Lev Grossman, New York Times-bestselling author of The Magicians
 
“This is a magnificent book.”
—Anne McCaffrey, award-winning author of the Dragonriders of Pern
 
“The great new fantasy writer we've been waiting for, and this is an astonishing book."
—Orson Scott Card, New York Times-bestselling author of Ender’s Game
 
“It's not the fantasy trappings (as wonderful as they are) that make this novel so good, but what the author has to say about true, common things, about ambition and failure, art, love, and loss.”
—Tad Williams, New York Times-bestselling author of Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn
 
“Jordan and Goodkind must be looking nervously over their shoulders!”
—Kevin J. Anderson, New York Times-bestselling author of The Dark Between the Stars
 
“An extremely immersive story set in a flawlessly constructed world and told extremely well.”
—Jo Walton, award-winning author of Among Others
 
“Hail Patrick Rothfuss! A new giant is striding the land.”
—Robert J. Sawyer, award-winning author of Wake
 
“Fans of the epic high fantasies of George R.R. Martin or J.R.R. Tolkien will definitely want to check out Patrick Rothfuss' The Name of the Wind.”
—NPR
 
“Shelve The Name of the Wind beside The Lord of the Rings...and look forward to the day when it's mentioned in the same breath, perhaps as first among equals.”
—The A.V. Club
 
“I was reminded of Ursula K. Le Guin, George R. R. Martin, and J. R. R. Tolkein, but never felt that Rothfuss was imitating anyone.”
—The London Times
 
“This fast-moving, vivid, and unpretentious debut roots its coming-of-age fantasy in convincing mythology.”
—Entertainment Weekly
 
“This breathtakingly epic story is heartrending in its intimacy and masterful in its narrative essence.”
—Publishers Weekly (starred)
 
“Reminiscent in scope of Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series...this masterpiece of storytelling will appeal to lovers of fantasy on a grand scale.”
—Library Journal (starred)

Autorentext
Patrick Rothfuss is the bestselling author of The Kingkiller Chronicle. His first novel, The Name of the Wind, won the Quill Award and was a Publishers Weekly Best Book of the Year. Its sequel, The Wise Man’s Fear, debuted at #1 on The New York Times bestseller chart and won the David Gemmell Legend Award. His novels have appeared on NPR’s Top 100 Science Fiction/Fantasy Books list and Locus’ Best 21st Century Fantasy Novels list. Pat lives in Wisconsin, where he brews mead, builds box forts with his children, and runs Worldbuilders, a book-centered charity that has raised more than six million dollars for Heifer International. He can be found at patrickrothfuss.com and on Twitter at @patrickrothfuss.

Leseprobe
PROLOGUE
**A Silence of Three Parts

It was night again. The Waystone Inn lay in silence, and it was a silence of three parts.

The most obvious part was a hollow, echoing quiet, made by things that were lacking. If there had been a wind it would have sighed through the trees, set the inn’s sign creaking on its hooks, and brushed the silence down the road like trailing autumn leaves. If there had been a crowd, even a handful of men inside the inn, they would have filled the silence with conversation and laughter, the clatter and clamor one expects from a drinking house during the dark hours of night. If there had been music...but no, of course there was no music. In fact there were none of these things, and so the silence remained.

Inside the Waystone a pair of men huddled at one corner of the bar. They drank with quiet determination, avoiding serious discussions of troubling news. In doing this they added a small, sullen silence to the larger, hollow one. It made an alloy of sorts, a counterpoint.

The third silence w…