Fantastic narration by Vikas Adam.

Forget the comparisons…..read/listen for the pure art of storytelling.
You will not be disappointed.

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Glorious Narration

First up, the narration. Vikas Adam is devine. The characters both male and female, young and old were clear and discernable without being cliché. He gives each character life and form, his accents were absolute perfection. It's a smooth almost soothing listen for such a long story. First class performance.

The story. There are really very few original story arcs in the fantasy genre. They usually follow similar lines in one way or another. That's why something so unique as Patrick Rothfuss’ ‘Name of the wind’ series stands out so much. I went into this trying to give the benefit of the doubt and not compare the two, but after a while it was struggle. There really are too many "similarities" here that it's almost impossible to ignore which is such a shame because I don't think it was the intention.

It's good story, it really is. Sadly because NOTW is so popular and loved this isn't getting the credit it's due. If the format could have been changed to be less copy, more nod, then I think it would be getting better reviews, but relying on a cultural twist to differentiate it isn't enough. It feels far too much like the same story in a different dress sometimes. Which is a shame, because it could be a wonderful story on its own with it without the similarities.

I have read and listened to both now and honestly, I really liked it. I recommend you give it a go and enjoy it for what it is, a colourful engaging and sometimes heartbreaking beginning to what I hope becomes a more original story as it goes. Give it a chance.

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slow, good, silar

slow to start, but then gets good. quite a lot of similarities to another well known series, but enjoyable nonetheless!

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A very entertaining story

Loved this story. of course it is compared to name of the wind and there are much similarities, but but it stands strong on its own and is very entertaining to listen to. Also great performance on voice acting and narration

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seems a bit familiar

Really enjoyed the story, but painfully similar to Name or The Wind which was a bit distracting,

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Good writing but needs to use his own ideas

I tried but couldn’t finish this. I found it very derivative from Patrick Rothfuss’ ‘Name of the wind’ series even down to the protagonist being socially unacceptable, time with theatre folk, street living, aiming for acceptance at the ashram (read arcanist university) and an enigmatic girl turning up. Even the magic described used similar mind beliefs alar/folding and binding/sympathy. Patrick did it better and created more believable characters. Narrator was good.

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9 people found this helpful

Brilliant from start to finish!!

I heard that this was a lot like the Name of the Wind. Is it? Yeah. If you gave two people a brief of a story and asked them to write exactly the timeline and characters to your specs, but name them whatever you like, set the story within whatever culture you like and mix up what happens inside the framed and outside the framed story - the outcome might be this and TNOTW. Is it a total ripoff? I don’t know. Could it be a fanfic that turned out to be a masterpiece? So far so good.

Is it as good? Imo its better. Way better. Virdi is a genius with words. His protagonist knows his own flaws. He knows when he’s being an ass. He admits when he isnt quite being honest and also admits to details he’s embellished. He’s likeable.

I guess the biggest topic, now that this book is out, is whether Virdi’s story will be finished before the Doors of Stone. Frankly, now that i have this, i can quit searching google for DOS updates. Virdi has a lot of published books under his belt. I believe in him. He’s brilliant. Buy the book, you won’t be disappointed!!

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Beautifully Written

A overall really good book with good foreshadowing done by the real time characters.
A lot of people and me including will compare it to The Name of the Wind. It has similarities but also really is its own book. And a good book at that. This is what I hope the first book in a long series.

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Yeah it’s a copy of NOTW…

But it was different enough that I enjoyed it just as much if not more.

Lets be honest an orphan that turns out to have power and meets a girl is pretty much a fantasy staple. This one just happens to borrow VERY heavily from an existing book. Not word for word, but it’s the same plot, narrative style etc.

But there were enough differences to
make it enjoyable, and based on the end it looks like it’s going somewhere different.

Personally i’d say if you haven’t read Name of the Wind, read this instead. The writing is better, and he copied a great story to start with. That’s just my opinion. Other reviews see it differently.

This series stands more of a chance of being finished, so I’d back this one!

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Fantastic debut

Phenomenal fantasy debut that takes clear inspiration from Patrick Rothfuss’ The Name of the Wind but still stands on its own completely. I had a fantastic time with the characters, plot, worldbuilding and themes of storytelling and “the making of a legend”.
My only two complaints are the length that definitely could’ve benefited from another round of editing, as well as the narration of the audiobook. Although the narrator did an overall decent job I really didn’t like the voice he put on for the female characters, especially Eloine. In fact it made me dislike her character, which obviously wasn’t the intended effect.

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