THE WISE MAN’S FEAR by Patrick Rothfus

Vol. II of the Kingkiller Chronicles.

Narrated by Nick Podehl­

     The Saga Now Becomes Epic

This is a long book; in fact the first two volumes of The Kingkiller Chronicles are longer than the entire Lord of the Rings trilogy! In the internal structure of the book this volume consists of the recollections of Kvothe to the Chronicler on the second day of his account of his life. And the story of Kvothe progresses very far indeed. It is so long and so engaging that even though the listener knows that this is not yet the end of the series you will not feel unsatisfied. I am more than willing to wait for Patrick Rothfus to take his own sweet time to get the next one right. It needs to be pretty good to fit in with the first two volumes. It is true that I don’t want this story to end, but I do want it to continue. I am hoping that after the next volume that Kvothe and Chronicler will decide that the telling is not complete and that a Day Four of Kvothe’s memoirs will be needed.

Nick Podehl is fast becoming one of my favorite narrators. His voicing of the many different characters is spot on. Always. One example of his skill is in telling the account of Kvothe’s time in Ademre with the mercenary Tempi. In this foreign land he expands upon the accent he created for the one character Tempi to a large population of speakers in Ademre. Each of the Adem has their own voice yet each is immediately distinguishable as similar to Tempi’s accent. Masterful.