A Wise Man’s Fear (Kingkiller Chronicles) (Patrick Rothfuss) 3/3

*****SPOILERS*****

 

Questions

Felurian only lets Kvothe go back to the human world because he promises to return and sing the song he’s writing for her. Is this why Kvothe doesn’t play music anymore, so he never finishes the song?

In the first book, Kvothe was furious when Chronicler found him because he was worried that other people would come after him. People like Felurian, perhaps? I’d say that’s a decent reason to hide.

Obviously being ‘the Kingkiller’ is already a good reason to hide but compared to the rest of this story, it would be rather mundane.

 

We learn that the highest ranking members of the Amyr (church knights) were fae. We also know that Haliax, the leader of the Chandrian, protects his subordinates from the Amyr.

Skarpi knew the (heretical) story of Haliax’s ‘creation’ and he said he had powerful friends in the church. Friends like the Amyr?

Also in this book Denna writes a song about the Chandrian but she doesn’t get killed like Kvothe’s troupe, so are the Amyr protecting her? Is her patron an Amyr? Is he is, then I’d guess he’s Skarpi.

This is vividly different from my thoughts in book one, in that Denna or at least her patron are Chandrian. I’m still more convinced by the Chandrian hypothesis than the Amyr hypothesis but either is believable.

 

Content Warning: sexual assault. [‘Skip to Kvothe often says, and demonstrates, how…’]

Remember Ambrose’s alchemised drink that made Kvothe lose all inhibitions? The constant humour? It came with a serious side. Sim was surprised that Kvothe was 100% sure that you shouldn’t ravage women. Fela said she thinks she knows why. When Kvothe is in Felurian’s glade later on, he has a memory of when he was in Tarbean with boys ripping his clothes off and saying everything they’d do to him. This sounds like a rape.

We’ve known since book one, when Denna in a delirium kept on offering Kvothe sex but he refused because she wasn’t in her right mind, that he has very strong moral views on rape. In book two, Kvothe saves two girls from sexual enslavement: he reassures them it’s not their fault and challenges everyone who insults them for being victims.

Of course, one doesn’t have to experience rape to defend the victims. I could be reading too much into it and stringing together unrelated information. Even though Kvothe is a fictional character, I still hope I’m wrong.

 

Kvothe often says, and demonstrates, how good he is at lying and embellishing. Is anything he’s telling the Chronicler true? Or is he building the best reputation he can, to silent rival rumours. He’s started many contradictory rumours about himself so it is within his character to do this.

 

 

Problems

Occasionally, queries pop up. Some things are simply mistakes, oversights or errors.

There’s an inn with one fiddler. The same Innkeeper calls this same fiddler ‘Seb’ and ‘Ben’. He doesn’t give anyone else two names. So this was a bit perplexing.

The similes are in the American style, e.g. ‘soft as a flower’. But then later we get one in the British style: ‘as lightly as a flower’. Why is there this difference? From s tyle point of view, it should be one or the other. Unless Americans do use both but they have different functions? Like how Americans have ‘farther’ instead of ‘further’ bar a few exceptions?

Kvothe studies lesson called ‘comparative female anatomy’. Because Kvothe is such a sexualised character by this point, this almost comes off as a pervert’s subject. From a medical perspective it’s important but it seems misplaced for it to be mentioned here. Perhaps the author’s shoehorning a piece of lore in where he can?

 

Kvothe frequently has sex in this book. ‘The Wise Man’s Sexploits’ may have been a more fitting title.

You wonder how he makes no one pregnant until he reveals he chews a specific herb every day. When did he start that? He was too blind and bashful pre-Felurian to people’s advances so I doubt he started it before he met her.

So perhaps Felurian had him eat it in her glade. But the Fae’s flora was very different to the ordinary world so could the herb grow in both places? Would Kvothe have the foresight to pluck a lifetime’s worth of herb before he left for the human world?

If it did grow everywhere, it probably wouldn’t manage to in inhospitable Ademre. The Adem wouldn’t sell it because they don’t believe in man-mothers (and the apothecary wouldn’t serve Kvothe anyway).

Maybe Kvothe did start chewing it at the university, in his world’s version of a condom in the wallet for the young and hopeful? But he was poor and only made necessary purchases.

There are answers to my questions but none is satisfying or convincing.

 

 

Conclusion

When Kvothe returns to the University, he says he’s been gone three-quarters of the year. Devi says he has two months left until his debt is due; the loan was for a year and a day. Thus there are eight months in the year. So the author, with a few bits of info, has told the readers how long a year is without ever directly stating it.

 

Kvothe’s tale concludes with a happy Kvothe with happy friends before returning to the miserable Kote of the present. By telling his story, Kote is becoming frustrated with his carefulness. Just as Bast wanted. Bast also wanted two soldiers to attack Kote and bring out his fighting abilities. His fighting abilities did not oblige. So the story ends with Bast standing over the soldiers and about to, I assume, kill them. It’s not a big or important cliff-hanger but I’m still curious!

 

So yes, this was a satisfying read. It was over a thousand pages long but at no point did it feel drawn out, weak or boring. To keep a narrative going for that long without losing the thread is impressive. Book two, the first sequel in this trilogy, took five years to release so it would be nice if the second sequel took no more than ten years to be released. (This time is almost up!) But rushing would only degrade the quality and that’s not desirable, although considering the high quality already this wouldn’t be too bad. Whatever the case, it should be worth the wait.

 

A Wise Man’s Fear (Kingkiller Chronicles) (Patrick Rothfuss) 2/3

*****SPOILERS*****

 

Kvothe Goes Adventuring

 

Threpe, a minor noble, send Kvothe off to see the Maer of Vintas (who’s descended from the old line of Vintas kings). Threpe tells Kvothe to ‘”address him as your grace.”’ No, ‘Your Grace’ in quotation marks (because that’s what Kvothe’s being told to say) and capitals (because it’s a style).

            Who else do we find in Vintas other than Denna! She appears wherever Kvothe is and their bond deepens. He tells Denna what he’s already told the Chronicler: her gift of lute case saved Kvothe’s lift. But we get no explanation as to how!

            Kvothe and Denna have an argument that became cruel in the space of a breath. That was bizarre. The Maer’s attitude to people similarly swung with such erratic ways. I didn’t make many notes on Kvote’s time at the Maer’s court because I was too engrossed. I love (fictional) political intrigue.

 

The Maer send Kvothe with mercenaries into the Eld forest to retrieve the stolen taxes.

It’s said that the Eld is as big as Vintas. But looking on the map, the Eld could fit inside Vintas at least twice. We don’t even see the edge of Vintas on the map so it could be more!

One of the mercenaries is Tempi, of the Adem. They’re silent, skilful fighters. Tam, a normal mercenary, calls Tempi’s mum a whore. When Kvothe explains what a whore is, Tempi thanks Tam for being kind. That was great.

There’s an incomplete sentence. ‘Camp is a misleading term, ‘encampment’ would be better.’ A conjunction, semi-colon or colon should replace the comma.

 

Whilst in the Eld, Kvothe follows the sex fae Felurian into the Fae, the world of the fae.

Fae was beautiful, stunning, and a complete contrast to the regular world. But my favourite thing was when Kvothe plays his flute naked and he notes that ‘my hand rested on the smooth wood of my lute.’ Mm-hm, I bet it did.

They had sex before they even said hello. Kvothe compares the experience to music and his body taunt like lute strings. Not bad for your first time. Then he stays in the Fae with regular sex. (You think I’ve written ‘sex’ too often in these sentences? Try reading sex constantly. Not what I signed up for but never mind.)

One sentence unnerves me. Kvothe said Felurian ‘kissed him with the wildness of a dozen children.’ No. Just no. You’ve just been shagging her. Don’t then compare her to children. Absolutely disgusting.

Kvothe sings Felurian a song that her love making sufficed and was nice. Felurian interrupting with ‘what?’ then ‘nice’ was hilarious. Kvothe wasn’t trapped in the Fae forever (like everyone else) because he had to finish the song.

 

 

Ademre

 

Tempi takes Kvothe to Ademre. He’s trained by Vashet to become a good swordfighter. (Compared to non-Adem’s he’s pretty great. Compared to the Adem, though, he’s a bit shabby.)           

Kvothe meets one-handed Nadu. When he dreams he has two hands. WEEP.

            Vashet says that something shouldn’t bother you unless it bruises you. This isn’t a viewed by the Adem in general but it’s an insight into Vashet’s character. For the Adem, the physical and the mental are one-in-the-same so ‘bruise’ doesn’t just mean a physical bruise. So Vashet, via her personal views, demonstrates he subtleties of Ademic concepts.

 

This was a really intriguing section of the book.

The author managed to create a different society really skilfully and it was believable. Including Adem beliefs that seem so clearly false that it shocks you to think people actually believe it: all cultures have these beliefs so this helped increase the believability of Adem culture. (Considering that all other cultures in the books seem mostly interchangeable, it was good to get this level of insight.)

They use sign language because speech is considered primitive and childlike. The same assessment is given to showing emotion, all but laughing and crying. (The difference lies in where the emotion comes from.) It turns out the silent Tempi is considered talkative by Adem standards.

 

The most interesting cultural difference (or at least to horny-teenager-Kvothe) is the Adem’s openness, and lack of shame, with nudity and sex. In its place, emotions and music are things that one should keep private.

They have sex with anyone they want (Kvothe and his teacher Vashet regularly go at it) and by ‘anyone’, ‘any number’ should be noted. It’s a hobby so why not share it with everyone?

Kvothe asks about sex, romance and love. Vashet gives a wise answer: ‘“There is a great deal of difference between a penis and a heart.”‘

During a training session, Kvothe gets an erection so Vashet tells him not to ignore it because it will throw him off balance. I can’t even deal with how funny this is.

The cultural belief that blew my mind was that the Adem don’t believe in fathers. No one’s associated sex with babies because everyone’s always having sex but not everyone’s always having babies. So they laugh at the idea of ‘man-mothers’. So that’s fine. But ‘anger’ is creation, used to do everything. Women takes a man’s anger (builds up because can’t use it) to make babies… and yet they have no concept of fatherhood? If you need men to make babies then how is that different from fatherhood? Like I said before, every culture has beliefs that are contradictory.

Without the idea of fathers, then there’s a risk of inbreeding. Not with brother’s nephews (because they’re clearly family) but fathers, uncles, paternal cousins… It’s a bit worrying. Considering the Adem are a hardy, healthy people, they’re not suffering from inbreeding depression but it’s a risk nonetheless. This could be why the Adem have no hair/eye colour variation but (1) Caucasians are the only race that have significant variation and (2) the Caucasian gene pool is smaller than other ethnicities, so this isn’t a viable link.

The Adem show willingness to have sex with foreigners so it’s bizarre that so few Adem do show any difference from the typical colouration. Most of Ademre’s money comes from guarding foreigners, and women are just as likely as men to be mercenaries, so there are plenty of opportunities to make half-foreign babies.

 

Critique: A Wise Man’s Fear (Kingkiller Chronicles) (Patrick Rothfuss) 1/3

Thank goodness, speech marks are used speech! (For context, the previous book used quotation marks (‘x’) instead.)

 

The prologue wasn’t as powerful as the first book’s. It dealt with the same concept of the three silences in a slightly different way but I felt like it echoed the first a bit too much to successfully distinguish it.

 

*****SPOILERS*****

 

Some concepts gave me pause. In a brilliant, give-you-something-to-think-about away.

At the Inn in the present, Graham wonders if things are genuinely bad or they just seem bad compared with a happy youth. It’s good to see someone else understand the non-meaning of the ‘these days’ remarks.

Around the same time, Kote notes that you can’t risk asking someone something if everyone else knows it. That really shows you to be an outsider and thus garner more attention and suspicion.

The third one comes much later on. ‘Stories don’t need to be new to bring you joy.’ Rereading books or re-watching films or revisiting art galleries/museums… Having done them before doesn’t make it less valuable or a waste of time to do so again.

Kvothe implies his life’s a tragedy. The Chronicler and Bast agree that it’s not a tragedy if someone’s still alive. This makes Kvothe call them ‘so young’ (even though he’s younger than the Chronicler). I agree with Kvothe: not that his life’s a tragedy but that life can be a tragedy.

 

University

Ambrose (the bastard) has Denna’s ring so Kvothe steals it back.

Will writes a flirtatious note in his femininte handwriting so that Ambrose leaves his room. But Ambrose and Will work together as scribes so surely Ambrose would know?

Ambrose comes back early so Kvothe jumps out the window. The next day, people are speculating who the attempted burglar is. When Kvothe faints, the medic Mola diagnoses Kvothe with ‘”an acute case of jumping out the window last night.”’ Until this moment, Mola’s always been a serious, down-to-business character, so it made this humour all the more surprising.

Kvothe claims he was doing a friend a favour and Sim says it was getting his lady love’s ring back. Mola gets annoyed that Kvothe lied to her but honestly I don’t see where the lie is.

 

Kvothe’s university colleagues play a more prominent role in this book. They were important in book one but they’re a lot more involved with the critique.

Will makes mention that Sim is the son of a duke and Kvothe says he didn’t know. But the very first day Kvothe meets Sim, another noble teased Sim for being a noble of the Aturan Empire. Kvothe has a great memory so what happened? Kvothe should have just replied, “I remember” and then this wouldn’t be an issue.

The character Puppet reminds me of Master Elodin in his speech and behaviours. Perhaps they both went mad learning names and there’s a blue print to how a person behaves afterwards? Puppet had a very small role and, honestly, having him didn’t add much to the story for me. Maybe he has a bigger role in book three, in which case his brief appearance here would be justified.

            Ambrose gave Kvothe an alchemised drink to make him lose all his inhibitions except things that are important. It produces a few pages with a stream of complete hilarity. There was also a touching part where also tells Kvothe ‘I’m telling you three times’, just like Kvothe said to Bast in book one. It means Sim is still with Kvothe, even after so long apart.

 

Kvothe is put under trial by the church.

He’s cleared but he skips over it completely. Admittedly this book is big enough as it is but Kvothe’s been so forthcoming with everything else. It seems odd that he’d miss this out, considering how he clearly dislikes the church.

Master Elxa Dal recommends Kvothe takes a term off to save the University’s reputation. This is why Kvothe goes adventuring. (During this conversation, someone puts a strawberry on their cheese. Is this something people actually do?)

Elxa asks Kvothe how old he is and Kvothe says seventeen. Less than a year ago when Kvothe was first going under admissions, Kvothe said he was fifteen and he used his age as a reason to show why he should be admitted. It seems odd that Elxa forgot this and that Kvothe thought he could risk the lie.

 

Humour

The plot, the characters and the humour were all ramped up for this book.

Kvothe sees Denna with Kellen, someone who’s pretty, rich and talented, a combo ‘that was simply inexcusable.’ Hollar!

Kvothe said he was reading with one eye shut to not damage his whole brain.

Deoch, the co-owner of the Eolin bar, is bisexual. No one can think of the right word so Denna proposes ‘ambidextrous’ and it almost works.

Master Elodin is as brilliant in this book as the last. He casually take Kvothe on a rooftop walk to the Master Librarian’s window, after which Kvothe’s Archives ban is rescinded. The Master Librarian acted like Elodin talking to him on the rooftop was completely natural so you just wonder whatever Elodin has done.

The bit with Elodin that gets picked up the most is justifiably funny. Elodin makes everyone in his class share an interesting fact. When one student presents his (to me, very intriguing) fact, Elodin says, ‘”Wow. Your next task is to have sex. See me after class if you don’t know how.”’

Someone (Ambrose) is trying to kill Kvothe by using sympathy magic and stabbing a poppet. Kvothe makes a device to protect him and gets his friends to help him test it. When they’re making the doll, Sim says, ‘”Kvothe’s head is bigger than that.”’ He’s not wrong! When Sim stabs the doll, Kvothe shrieks and doubles over in pain. But he was just acting. That kept me giggling for some time.

 

Critique: The Singapore Grip (T.V. Series)

It’s easy to summarise this tv series in one word: brilliant. If two words were required, I’d be tempted to write ‘gripping’. 

People complained that the show was from a colonial perspective, even though the story was about white colonialists. People also complained that the Asian characters were underdeveloped, even though colonialists didn’t view Asians as anything more than a resource to exploit. A story’s perspective has to match the characters, however abhorrent it is: to do anything else wouldn’t be sensible.

*****SPOILERS*****

The main character Matthew Webb is a good soul. For someone who didn’t arrive in time before his father died, some distasteful words/actions would have been acceptable.

He respects all people despite their ethnicity and works for the UN with native peoples. He is constantly annoyed that the business, the government and the Europeans exploit the Asian natives for their own gain.

Walter Blackett’s hedonistic son Monty keeps on encouraging Matthew to go to prostitutes but he always refuses. He never says why but he sees it as taking advantage of the locals, most likely.

 

When Matthew first arrives on a military plane, the pilot warns Matthew of the Singapore grip and the soldiers laugh. I assume this means it’s a sex thing but then the pilot says it’s a fever… a sexy fever? So I’m confused and Matthew’s confused.

Each episode Matthew sees a few things that could be the Singapore grip: the uncertainty is always close at hand. Matthew audibly ponders it to many people, including Francois and Vera.

Francois doesn’t tell him what it is in Episode Two but in Episode Six it’s clear he knows. If he knew, why didn’t he tell him? Or did Francois only find out between Episodes Two and Six? Vera likewise doesn’t tell Matthew but in her defence she does show Matthew in the same episode.

 

Many viewers think Vera Chiang is manipulative. In all honesty I don’t see why. She is nice to Matthew and his father because they gave her a home and sanctuary.

In the second episode, Joan and Vera compete for Matthew’s attention, the former by taking off her bra and the latter by putting his hand to the skin of her breast. Vera just wants to move back into her home, a home she was forced to leave.

Vera takes Matthew to the dying house (he learns how Europeans exploit the natives) and then to her apartment (cramped and dirty compared to Matthew’s massive home for two). People thought she did this to make Matthew feel guilty. Seeing as Matthew’s job (which Vera knew about before meeting him) is about helping native peoples, making him aware of their trouble isn’t manipulative. Even if she didn’t know, wanting to help the exploited isn’t manipulative.

 

The Blacketts annoyed me to no end.

            Mr. Webb, Matthew’s father, has a heart attack at his birthday party, hosted at the Walter’s house with rival Langford in attendance. Naturally I think it’s sabotage. Did Langford do it to get rid of a rival, at Walter’s house to point the blame at him? Did Blackett do it to get full control of the business, with Langford in attendance to point the blame at him? (Why else would he invite someone who mutually despises him?) Nothing’s ever suggested but Walter is ambitious and scheming. Or maybe I just disliked him too much.

            The Blacketts bulldozed Matthew and Joan’s wedding. Even though he never said (or hinted) yes, the Blacketts are still surprised and angry when Matthew says no?

 

The Singapore Grip gave me plenty to laugh at. I was expecting it to be like any other period drama with a few funnies but we were served plenty more. Like every time Vera said, ‘”Kicked the bucket.”’

When Walter Blackett prepares a great display of rubbers, Monty tried to slip condoms in. That gave me a chuckle.

Vera showed Matthew a book of sex positions and his response is ‘Crikey’. That surprised a sizeable laugh out of me!

Vera says her Chinese people think all white people look the same. Considering white people say Asian people all look the same, this was a funny reverse.

Joan wouldn’t help Matt save Vera so Matt calls her ‘a complete bitch’. Then later in that episode, her American ex-dater called her a ‘selfish bitch’. That was satisfying.

 

When they’re captured by Japanese soldiers, Matthew is asked whether he believes all nations can live in peace and harmony. He says “Yes.” Considering our world right now is dividing itself with bricks of hatred and mortar of disgust, this is the message we need right now. Cut to six months later and they’re in a labour camp. We don’t see them get rescued (which is what I expected but was glad to not see) but Vera has sneaks some food and notes to Matthew. This shows that Vera genuinely cares.

Critique: The Name of the Wind (Kingkiller Chronicles) (Patrick Rothfuss) 3/3

*****SPOILERS*****

 

Denna 

Denna is Kvothe’s love interest. He’s overly smitten in my opinion but never mind. It’s certainly obsessive and bordering creepy.

            Everyone seems to know her by different names (Dinnah, Dyanae, Dianne etc) and no one seems to know much about her. She never stays anywhere for long and disappears without saying anything. (At one point Denna’s concerned Kvothe will do this to her. The irony!)

Attachments are difficult for Denna so it’s nice to see her fondness for Kvothe. She even mentions her secretive patron-to-be ‘Master Ash’, whose real name she guards as strongly as her own. When Denna’s in her delirium, she’s really sweet as she opens up to Kvothe.

The second time Kvothe and Denna see each other is at the Eolian, a bar where the best musicians play. (Kvothe wins his ‘pipes’ on his first try, making him one of the best.) Denna doesn’t say his name (he thinks she forgot him) and she calls herself a different name (he wonders if it’s a different person). But if either of the bracketed were true, Denna wouldn’t have run up to Kvothe in the way she did.

Denna compares Kvothe to willow, bending to the wind’s desires. That made me laugh because he wants to learn the name of the wind to bend it to his desires. Also, he wants to be a namer but adores Denna who doesn’t have ‘a’ name.

When a draccus comes near them, Kvothe says they’re fine because draccus are herbivores, like a giant cow. (He learnt this from the Chronicler’s book, incidentally.) When it breathes fire again, Denna says, “Moo” and I couldn’t stop laughing.

 

Kvothe hears of a destroyed wedding and connects the details with the Chandrian warning signs. So he goes gallivanting off and meets an injured Denna, the wedding’s musician and only survivor.

            Denna tells Kvothe that Master Ash took her aside and told her to come back later. When she does, there’s burning, screaming and blue fires. The house, we’re told, was expensive, so the wood had rotted, and the iron rusted, faster than natural. These are all warning signs of the Chandrian.

            Kvothe mentions Denna’s pale skin. Not, the Chandrian song mentions ‘a woman pale as snow’. Denna also appears at key moments and we know the Chandrian can teleport. So maybe Denna is a Chandrian? Perhaps Master Ash is one too: Kvothe’s focal Chandrian Cinder, and what’s left after something’s in cinders? Ash. So there are curiosities.

 

 

Problems

It’s a big book. Thankfully there aren’t any big problems but it size does mean there are plenty of opportunities for little mistakes. (Although I’ve read books a quarter the size with ten times the mistakes so proportionally, this book’s doing rather well.)

Kvothe says not many people have accents anymore. *Sigh*. As it’s in first person, I’ll let this slip due to character ignorance.

Kvothe ‘admitted’ one thing and the very next time he speaks, he ‘admitted’ that, too. Some variety (especially among neighbours) would be nice! Even something like ‘admitted again’ would suffice.

‘Bastas, son of Remmen, Prince of Twilight and the Telwyn Mael’. Which one is the prince? The sentence structure is too ambiguous to provide an answer. The sentence structure also implies that only one of them is the prince.

In middle of Kote’s perspective, there’s one paragraph in Bast’s perspective. It’s not separated from Kote’s perspective in any way.

When Fela calls for help, Kvothe says this means no one else knows she’s in danger. Um… yeah. That’s the point of calling for help: so people come over and help. But this was written as one of Kvothe’s bright, unexpected revelations.

 

We get some good, old-fashioned grammatical mistakes.

            For example, ‘I gave a hesitant nod, trick questions were fairly common.’ It’s an incomplete sentence, missing a conjunction (or perhaps replacing the comma with a semi-colon).

            ‘Have you heard the expression white muting?’ There should be quotation marks around ‘white muting’ because it’s a phrase in referral to something outside the conversation.

First, Kvothe’s parents loved each other so they saw no point marrying for ‘any government and God’. Now, the latter should be a miniscule because ‘any… God’ is weird (unless every God’s proper noun is ‘God’). Or if they did just mean one God, it should have been ‘God or any government’.

 

Abenthy pours his beer into the floor then straight away refills it. Him emptying his mug didn’t demonstrate his point. Sometimes people pour their drink on the floor if they’ve had enough, but if he’d had enough then he wouldn’t have refilled it straight away. It could be a quirk of his personality but in that case we should have seen it more than once, just so that it’s peculiar yet established.

 

Wearing just his towel, Kvothe wanders into a clothes shop. A whore, he says, will only give back his stolen clothes in exchange for his purse. But handing over his purse would be handing over his dignity. He trails off and supposes a gentleman’s dignity is in his purse. Um… yes? What else could that have meant? When he recalls his father said something similar, it made the tailor laugh. (I still don’t know what the joke is but never mind.)

 

Conclusio

This is among the most cleverly written novels I’ve read. All the characters were fleshed out and the plot was consistently engaging. I’ve reread it (and the sequel) many times and it doesn’t bore me.

            One character that didn’t get a say in the other sections was Schiem the Swineheard. He was brilliant. (Apart from his prejudice towards the Edema Ruh. It’s a common prejudice but no less ugly for it.) His accent was Irish-y, particularly with the ‘I’s, but was more a jumble of various accents stitched together. Yet the accent was consistent: people struggle to write real accents consistently so to create one and keep it consistent is really impressive.

            Kvothe says, and more often shows, that he’s not beyond lying or exaggeration. We also know he makes contradicting rumours to keep people confused and guessing. Seeing he’s now in hiding to protect himself, is he likely to provide an honest account? (If it’s all fake, he’s definitely an amazing story teller.)

Knowing the names of every star and their stories, for example, but no one has a long enough life or big enough memory to achieve this because there are literally millions of stars. Did he really kill angels and speak to gods? So we must take everything in this story with a bucket of salt.

It makes you curious to find out the other truths he’ll reveal and lies he’ll make in the second book.

Critique: The Name of the Wind (Kingkiller Chronicles) (Patrick Rothfuss) 2/3

 

*****SPOILERS*****

Edema Ruh

When Kote tells his story (of Kvothe), it’s in first person. This makes sense: he is telling the Chronicler his own story. Occasionally we get Interludes back at the Inn where it changes back to third person. He remains ‘Kvothe’ in the prose until he has to become the innkeeper again, when the prose returns him to ‘Kote’. This was a good feature and it helps to delineate the Kote of the present with the talented Kvothe of the past.

 

Kote is of the Edema Ruh.

These are travelling court performers with a noble patron. They have many traditions that separate them from other people. The way they offer food/drink to new guests is particularly distinctive. They all take a day off whenever they encounter a greystone/weystone (standing stones, said to lead to the Fae). This last one stood out because it’s not expected for travellers to stay put.

At one town, the mayor will pay them to leave. Kvothe lists the things the mayor should’ve done! (Spoilt, much?) Yes the mayor was disrespectful but Kvothe’s idea of respect is a bit… bratty? There’s definitely an element in this but his troupe is dead. Is it unsurprising that his opinion of them is a little higher and other people’s opinion of them isn’t as high as it should be?

Kvothe makes Abenthy join the troupe after seeing him control the wind (‘storybook magic’). My favourite description of him is that his singing kept ‘wondering off, looking for notes in the wrong places’ which is also the best description of bad singing I’ve ever seen. Abenthy teaches the young Kvothe Alar and sympathy, the keys to magic.

 

Kote mentions that he’s of the Edema Ruh a lot and we get loads of tidbits. But I still have plenty of questions!

The book gave the strong vibe that the Ruh are an ethnic group. Yet later at the University, Kvothe meets a Caeldian (who are of different ethnicity to everyone else) who knows Kvothe is Ruh and says ‘one family’. So this implies that the Edema Ruh isn’t a race? Although we get many examples of Ruh adopting other people into their families so perhaps ethnicity isn’t the defining factor of being Ruh.

The Ruh often clear the road of trees. Kvothe’s dad states that he should charge the consular for every tree they remove. A consulate is a diplomatic delegation either to significant areas in a foreign country (other than the capital with the embassy) or to represent a significant areas in the home country to a foreign country. The patron of Kvothe’s troupe is only a baron: for the lowest noble rank to have a consulate seems odd.

 

University

After his parents died, Kvothe spent half a year in the wilderness then as a beggar in Tarbean. He travels to the University (he’s accepted as a student at 15) with a woman called Denna (he fancies her a lot).

He’s accepted aged fifteen to the University. To be admitted into the Arcanum, where magic is taught, he must show the Masters evidence of sympathy. He has access to the Archives at long last to do his research on the Chandrian.

Elodin, the Master Namer, is full of eccentricities and humour. Naming is ‘storybook magic’ and often drives people mad (he spent time in an asylum). Kvothe begs to be his student so Elodin asks Kvothe to jump off the roof. When Kvothe does so, Elodin says Kvothe’s too stupid to be his student. That made me laugh for ages.

 

Kvothe interacts with a student for a page and a bit and only then in the prose does he name him as Ambrose. In all other introductions, we learn the names by people’s speech or Kvothe giving context in the prose as soon as the new character is mentioned. So for Kvothe to wait for Ambrose and Ambrose alone was odd.

            The next time Kvothe sees Ambrose is when he’s accosting Fela. Kvothe, who’s only fifteen, makes perspective comments about how body language can pin you down and yet it’s the victim (Fela) who feels guilty, not the perpetrator (Ambrose). Kvothe rants about Ambrose’s poetry (honestly I could directly quote the entire passage. It was golden perfection).

Ambrose gets Kvothe banned from the Archives and their rivalry begins (it’s why Kvothe came to the University, after all). There’s sabotage and humiliation on both sides but Ambrose breaking Kvothe’s lute makes it truly personal. The scene of Kvothe with his broken lute was so painful. I’ve never felt a character’s sorrow so vividly before.

 

The Master that we see the most is Hemme. What a prat!

Master Hemme is rude to everyone except Rian, the only woman in the class. Until, that is, he tells her to close her legs then says, ‘“Now the gates of Hell are shut”’. It’s a funny line but it solidifies Hemme as a resounding git.

Hemme tries to embarrass Kvothe into giving a lecture about sympathy. Kvothe does so and humiliates Hemme with a fiery demonstration. Sure, Kvothe gets whipped but he uses this as evidence of sympathy, meaning he’s admitted into the Arcanum. His friend Simmon congratulates him by offering to buy a bandage or a beer. (Simmon will make anyone laugh.)

For his broken lute, Kvothe charges Ambrose with theft and destruction of property. Master Hemme says that theft implies possession and people can’t possess something that’s been destroyed. This is stupid because (1) theft is the act of taking, not the state of ownership, (2) the pieces can be possessed, and (3) Hemme’s argument would mean we could never destroy our own property. All this went through my head, and then the book spelled out 1 and 2. It was nice to see the stupidity was Hemme’s, not the author’s!

 

Critique: The Name of the Wind (Kingkiller Chronicles) (Patrick Rothfuss) 1/3

***SPOILERS***

 

The Prologue was a work of art. It’s nice to see a clever idea that’s cleverly done. It talks of three silences within the Waystone Inn. The first is because the tavern lacks its usual noise. The second is because the people inside choose not to talk, choose to be silent. The third was in the regular actions of the bar keep (so he made that silence). The silences are the ‘sound of the man waiting to die.’ One pay in and it’s already dark and macabre.

 

The Inn

Innkeeper Kote lives in Newarre, a village in the Commonwealth. The most frequent measurement in a ‘span’, equal to eleven days.

 

The younger patrons listen to Old Cob’s story (never his advice) and the reader gets background info on the world. Tehlu founded the main religion. Taborin the Great is an oft-mentioned hero. Aleph created the world and named everything; Aleph, of course, being like ‘alpha’, i.e. the first. But perhaps the most relevant lore is that of the Chandrian, evil individuals that come with warning signs like rotting wood and blue fire. One nice description is that they’re ‘yoked to shadows’.

 

Carter carries a scrael, a giant spider, into the inn. The shape, colour and textures of the scrael are described so well. Texture’s often missed out in descriptions so it’s good to see it done, let alone done well. Carter opens the blanket on purpose and yet it still makes him recall. His response of surprise and/or shock seems unwarranted. When Kote lists all the ways a scrael can be killed, someone mentions God which Kote agrees to in a begrudging manner.

 

Kote’s student is Bast, a cloven-hooved fae who calls his master ‘Reshi’ and is infused with confidence and a ‘casual grace’. Like in folklore, iron hurts the fae, so much so that he complains how primitive ‘you people are’ for using iron needles.

Kote asks Bast to listen three times and Bast confirms he has three times. Is this to go with the three silences?

Kote keeps on persuading Bast to study and the pupil does pick up a big book. To crush a walnut, to be sure, but at least he picked it up. That was great.

Even after an hour of mopping, the water’s clean. We know Kote can’t use magic so this must be Bast.

Kote is bored with life. His magic and music are dead. He thinks the war is his fault. Bast is searching for someone to make Kote feel and live again.

Bast tells Kote for sneaking off and only leaving a note. ‘What am I, some dockside whore?’ Bearing in mind Bast is the apprentice, how can Kote be the one to sneak out? This just shows Bast’s fondness for Kote, like how Bast brushes Kote’s hair like a mother would. (Although when a note reads ‘I am probably dead’, anger’s to be expected. I wasn’t expecting anything like that in the note so it surprised a laugh out of me.)

 

We’re introduced to the Chronicler.

He knows who Kote really is: Kvothe. This scares the innkeeper, going so far as to ‘commit the room to memory’, because he has a bounty on his head. To be expected when you’re the ‘Kingkiller’, I suppose.

The Chronicler wants Kote’s life story. Although he agrees to tell it, Kote threatens to not let the Chronicler go after knowing what he knows. The threat made the Chronicler change his plans to suit Kote’s wants, even though the substance of the threat was non-existent.

The Chronicler can transcribe any language thanks to his cipher which represents sounds, not letters. Different languages can have different sounds to each other so I hope he researched foreign languages!

Kote learns from the Chronicler that some people think Kvothe is the new Chandrian. This deeply unnerves Kote. It’s unsurprising, considering he didn’t hide his obsession with the Chandrian from anyone.

 

 

Lore

The Chandrian are the driving force of the narrative. Kvothe wants to research them and decides the University’s Archives will be most useful.

In his youth, Kvothe returns to camp and finds the troupe slaughtered. All the warning signs of the Chandrian are present, as are the beings themselves. The one that grabs his focus most (now and in the future) is Cinder. (Nice: fiery name for fiery monsters.)

Haliax states that he keeps his fellow Chandrian safe from the Amyr, the Sithe and the singers. We know about the first two but the last’s not spoken of again. The Chandrian did kill the troupe because Kvothe’s father was composing a song about the Chandrian so maybe that’s something to do with it? I’m looking forward to this being revealed.

 

The key to sympathy/magic is ‘Alar’, willing something to happen.

For example, a sympathetic link can be established between two coins, and lifting one lifts the other. The more similar two items are, the stronger their link so the easier it is to influence each other. (Kvothe says this is a circular argument, but it’s not. I can’t think for the life of me why he thinks it is.)

Links aren’t perfect so energy is lost (lifting the two coins feels like lifting three). The weaker the link, the more energy is required. So the lore expands the concept of sympathy magic in real-world folklore yet expands it to fit in with the rules of physics.

 

Kvothe met Skarpi in Tarbean. The old man told a story where Lanre, a hero in the Tehlan religion, became the first Chandrian Haliax. Tehlan priests arrest Skarpi for heresy but he states he has friends in the church. (No doubt this will be an important detail to remember.)

The story foreshadowed Lanre’s fate: he kills a beast with ‘breath of darkness’ and wore its scales that felt like ‘a skin of shadows’ (perfect foreshadowing as this matches the Chandrain). Lanre died so his lover Lyra brought him back to life. When Lyra died, Lanre couldn’t bring her back to life (even after making ‘a terrible trade’). Lanre committed suicide but Lyra’s magic brought Lanre back to life.

The story also paints Amyr as people, including Tehlu, turned into beings with fiery wings by Aleph. Officially, the Amyr were church knights that disappeared when the Aturan Empire collapsed three hundred years ago.

This threw me at first because the Aturan Empire is still in the map and when a country’s described as collapsed, it means it stops existing. But here the author uses ‘collapse’ as in the empire collapsed in size. As if it could no longer support its own weight. This was truly clever.

Critique: Cursed (Netflix Series) 2/2

*****SPOILERS*****

 

Merlin

Merlin is portrayed in what can only be described as ‘Jack Sparrow’: super drunk and super camp. Thankfully this ended with episode one, seeing a more thoughtful and proactive character.

After Merlin is saved from execution (what Uther’s mother calls ‘an exciting day’), he laughs. It’s not a laugh that I’d expected from Merlin’s character (or actor). But blimey! It had dry humour, irony, surprise, and a lingering sense of ‘oh fuck I’m gonna die’. It was perfect for the moment and really opened out the character.

Merlin helps Nimue control her magic, saying she could be a ‘Shadow Lord’. There’s the implication that these individuals lead the sorcerers; apart from Merlin being a fallen Shadow Lord, details are thin. Perhaps Odin and the Widow are also Shadow Lords.

 

Merlin is Nimue’s true father.

He teaches her how to use magic and shows her his memories with her mother. Seeing how parents snogging, grabbing and everything else that leads to sex on the temple’s alter (no less!),  Nimue shouts, ‘”No thank you. No to this, please.”’ That gave me a proper chuckle.

Nimue also sees her mother pull the Devil’s Tooth from Merlin’s body (how did it get in there?!) after which he loses his magic. Then Nimue’s mum says she destroyed the sword which sends Merlin packing. This explains why Merlin was genuinely surprised to learn the Devil’s Tooth still existed and it explains how he didn’t know Nimue was his daughter. And the alcoholism.

Sword has certain effect on people. Whenever Nim holds it, her speech becomes more epic and courtly, as if every sentence is part of a great speech. It’s the way only legendary figures speak, not how people speak in real life. YET. This only happens when Nimue holds the sword. Merlin often states that the sword changes a person, so seeing how it alters Nimue’s speech was a nice demonstration of that.

How did it get in Merlin? The handle was in his chest and the blade went down. So blade point start at chest and handle really high, longer than his arms could reach. We get memories of him using magic so that’s not beyond imagination. Still, it would be nice to get solid confirmation of what happened.

 

 

Human Characters

Arthur is Nimue’s love interest. Arthur tries to reassure Nimue into joining him in the hot spring by saying, ‘”I’ve seen a naked woman before.”’ Nimue responds with, ‘”And we are all very impressed.”’ Brilliant.

In this story, he’s Morgana’s brother. He also has a random fae, who wears a badger on his head, as an annoying sidekick. For twenty minutes. Why does tv kill all the quirky characters?

He gives up his ways as a sell-sword to help Nimue and the fae. Would he had bothered to help the fae if it wasn’t for Nimue? He does seem always aware of what’s wrong and right, even when he does something wrong, so I’d like to think he’d help the fae regardless.

Arthur’s skin tone is darker than Uther. This led to questioning if they were related or not. If he were a prince, he wouldn’t have such freedom unless he had guards or if he had people searching for him (which he didn’t) confirmed it. Considering the Devil’s Tooth confers kingship to its barer, this explains how Arthur could be Uther’s successor.

 

Morgana is both a nun and a key member of the fae resistance.  In a time where human and fae don’t trust each other, this is good to see. Her girlfriend (also a nun) dies as the nunnery burns.

She has more of a fighter’s heart than her brother, even though he’s the sell-sword. Morgana writes Merlin a note, saying if he doesn’t meet with Nimue, the Wolf Blood Witch would soak the land with Paladin blood. Nimue makes Morgana take it out and Morgana mopes because it was ‘the best part’. I can’t decide if this is funny and dark or if it’s funny because it’s dark.

Her nun girlfriend dies in the nunnery fire. Twice after this they see each other, as a gift from the Cailleach. After the first time, Morgana gets infected (?) by the Cailleach and her fighter’s spirit becomes single-minded and less tactful and remorseful.

Now, the Cailleach is my favourite Celtic being, being both powerful and benevolent. Yet fiction always makes her malevolent. There’s nothing wrong with being creative with the imagination of people past and present. There’s also nothing wrong with pointing out the truth of the matter: the Cailleach is good.

 

Uther’s mother is an intriguing character.

She’s always making poisonous meals. Even when she’s in a war tent, she has her hobby to keep her busy. Never mind Uther kept her locked in a tower yet doesn’t question how she escaped.

By Merlin she’s called ‘Queen Regent’. Um, no. Uther rules the kingdom so who and what is she regent for? When her husband died and their baby was yet to be born, sure, she was regent then, but you don’t keep the title of ‘regent’ after you’re no longer regent.

We also learn that Uther isn’t really the queen’s child. This means that the Ice King’s claim as true heir to the English throne is correct. (He is a Scandinavian raider. The story’s set too early to have Vikings. Mind you, time consistency isn’t this show’s forte.)

 

Iris the nun is only a child (reportedly) but this somehow makes her all the more awful.

After the Red Paladins reject her as a member, she asks God for a sign, has a temper tantrum for getting no reply, then sees Morgana’s cross in the ash. So naturally she burns the nunnery down. Some fae bring Iris to their safe-haven and she keeps on trying to kill Nimue but fails because she picks the wrong moments.

In the last episodes, Iris shoots Nimue who falls down the waterfall (this is painful because Squirrel taught Iris how to use a bow). As a reward, Iris is made a Trinity Guard. Red Paladins came for Merlin straight after the murder so maybe they saw what happened? Otherwise I’m not sure how the Pope would have found out apart from Iris telling someone (and really, who’s going to believe a woman in that day and age?)

 

 

Conclusion

So it looks like Nimue, the main character, is dead. Maybe. Ordinarily, I’d think there couldn’t be another series but the cliff-hanger was a bit too dramatic to not get answered. Even if she is dead, the Cailleach can bring the dead to the world of the living. Morgana can petition for this, especially under the influence of Merlin.

            Merlin and Morgana went gallivanting off with the Devil’s Tooth. Will he destroy the sword like he wanted or use it to help the fae like Nimue wanted? Fae coexistence with humans would be beneficial so someone both humans and fae trust. Such as a human that was the fae queen’s partner, like the brother of Merlin’s companion, perhaps? Arthur owning the sword that bestows true kingship would explain how he’d become king after Uther.

            Nimue was chosen by the Hidden to become the new ‘Summoner’. It was made out to be a big deal but it wasn’t explained what this meant. Yes, she can ‘summon’ the Hidden to do her will but her village knew this yet this was precicely why they didn’t want Nimue to be chosen. With her people dead, will this ever be answered? How do I summon the answer to this?

            It’s been an interesting take on the legends. With the church involved, I’d be surprised if the Holy Grail doesn’t make an appearance in the future (even though Christianity was a much later revision on centuries-old legends). The legends have been a useful framework: Arthur drove back the Scandinavian invaders; Lancelot was sinful but now is trying to redeem himself; Morgana is going to the dark side and has the next series to bond with Merlin.

            There’s a lot going on and still a lot to go on in this story. It’ll be interesting to see where it goes next.