But No....

The Kingkiller Chronicles first two books were narrated by a talented voice actor who's performance made this already amazing series even more enjoyable, you'd expect him to narrate the next item in the series. But no, instead we get the author - and while not a complete failure of a reader he certainly did little to nothing to elevate this material. He read rapidly, somewhat breathily, somewhat pretentiously.

Auri is one of the most delightful characters in The Kingkiller Chronicles, you'd expect a book about her to be interesting. But no, instead we get this. If you're into feng shui or interior decorating maybe you'll get a kick out of reading about Auri constantly re-arranging everything.

There was a lot of potential here for an interesting book, every now and then we get teased with some tidbit from Auri's past. But no, we can't have that, where does this bottle want to be again??

"But no" - I should've counted how many times that exact phrase was used in this book...

I'd like to know who is paying for these glowing 5 star reviews or if they got a different book than I did?

I'd also like to rate this higher than one star. But no....

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495 people found this helpful

I love you man, but the book is bad.

I took all the advise he gives in the beginning, I was not expecting blood or fighting, I understood this is the story of Ari, first I understood that meant it will be explained why she became to be, who she was but it is just a description of how she sees the world. Fine, I love Ari, I want to know anything about her, even that means a 3h 30 min of a dull story. Calling the story different is accurate, I wouldnt call it 'mesmerizing' 'charming' or 'delightful' as I seen on others reviews. You really got me angry on the end note saying "F*** those people" to whoever doesnt like the story, really? You knew the book was not material to sell, and people, your fans, the people who buy your books and wait for the next one will want anything about Ari, but you knew this is not good enough.

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259 people found this helpful

Take author's advice, do not buy this book

Any additional comments?

I loved the first two books, saw the 4.4 star rating, so I purchased this book. Unfortunately, I didn't hear the author's warning until after I purchased the book. After an hour of pointless nonsense, I skipped to the final 20 minutes just to see how it ended. From the high rating, I guess I'm in the minority, but I think this book is completely unnecessary.

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229 people found this helpful

I was warned.

When Rothfuss says this book isn't for everyone, believe him. I found it slow and tedious. The audio book though is great for insomniacs.

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151 people found this helpful

A slow regard of Silent things - hmmmmmmmm

OK - so most of us who bought this book are fans of Rothfuss' Kingkiller chronicles. So, we already love his work. No question.

This work, however, is a mixed bad.

The sentences are masterfully crafted. The prose, description and witty use of personification of inanimate objects - all are masterfully done. If we were just looking at those things, this book would be compared to works of the greatest literary masters. That is my opinion, of course. Others may think differently.

Unfortunately, all that greatness isn't put together into an overall structure that makes sense and creates a reasonable story.

If this was a soup, I'd say that Rothfuss' ingredients were perfectly prepared and of the best quality, but they were not put together well into a good theme that produces a delicious and nutritious soup.

I thought his performance was better than I expected. Sometimes, because authors are great at writing, they make the mistake of thinking they're also gifted dramatic actors. I expected that Rothfuss' reading would be a lot worse than what was presented here. It was actually ok - it didn't truly distract from the work- the lack of a good over-arching story did.

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129 people found this helpful

Ruined Ari for me

Yes it’s my fault for buying before reading reviews, I hope i can get a refund.
It’s very frustrating listening to this after finishing the second book just yesterday. There is nothing clever or interesting about this book.

This book ruined my love of Ari. I knew she was a little odd from the other books but they also made her seem clever and interesting, maybe a student of master namer. “But no...” this books just describes her as a crazy OCD madwoman.

I honestly wish I did not listen to this, I would be much happier

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102 people found this helpful

Absolute Waste of Time

This book is absolute rubbish, in my opinion. In the preface, Rothfuss says you probably shouldn't buy this book. In the coda he says why he thought this would never be published and people would be pissed for buying it. All true in my case. I found zero value.

The book has curiously high ratings on Goodreads. While I'd like to think that it is all people being mindless fanboys and girls, I am willing to entertain that for some reason this book "spoke" to a portion of people.

The title very adequately pegs what the novel is about. The book follows Auri as she walks through various buildings and picks things up and makes candles, soap, etc and obsessively washes her body. There is nothing else. There is no dialogue or plot. I highly suggest that you take a peek in a bookstore before buying it to determine if you would enjoy it.

Here's the thing - I have quite a few literature and creative writing classes under my belt. Most of what I read in classes I really enjoyed. There were some famous books that I just didn't enjoy and typically these were novels that explored unusual methods of writing. For this reason, I think that Rothfuss' exploration of writing - in ways that aren't typically accepted - was too much of a leap for me.

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68 people found this helpful

I wanted to know more about Auri - I know nothing more

I was really looking forward to learning about Auri - her past, what makes her tick, etc. I got none of that in this. Just a random jumble of words and the phrase "but no" entirely too often. Maybe it's my engineer brain but I did not grok this story at all.

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65 people found this helpful

I'd rename it, "The Slow Regard of OCD Things"

Look... I LOVE The Name of the Wind series. I LOVE Auri. I love Patrick Rothfuss' writing. But three + hours of skittering around in Auri's whackadoo mind is just. too. much. I can see why he enjoyed writing it... total play on words, the flagrant exploration of the "essense" (as perceived by a crazy person, albeit a sweet, harmless crazy person) of inanimate "things" was probably fun to write, fun to explore. But for the reader? It was just painful. I listened to the whole thing, but it was more a dutiful and drudgeryish experience than anything, rather than enjoyable. I get the idea that most of us are a little bit broken, and most of us often feel lonely, but 6-7 days worth of narrative from the rambling, mercurial mind of a crazy girl just got to be way the heck too much. I will never listen to it again.

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56 people found this helpful

Clearly, I should have believed the forward

Patrick Rothfuss wrote two very good books and promised a third. Sadly, he detoured into the mind of a young woman, a minor character (apparently a very small one, judging from the all the times she thinks about how small she is) who has managed to build a life that involves nothing but musings on which item should sit where and next to what and the items feelings about it. She wonders around in the Underthing (???) with no explanation for how she got there or where she came from (although I may have missed it, I kept falling asleep). It was very poetic. it was slow, it was boring. It was an experiment. For me, it failed.

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45 people found this helpful