The Name of the Wind

Alright, where to begin.

First off, I find giving this 2 stars a tiny bit cruel (as it is well written), but I just did not care about any of it.

The story is about Kvothe (whom is telling his life's story, so there's a mix of the present and the past). I quite get that most of us paint ourselves in a better light than we actually are when recounting events, but not so much that it becomes utterly ridiculous. Kvothe is amazing at everything. He's slaying records left and right, creating legends and stories about him on his first day, has no problems with whatever task he is set out to do. Every woman he ever meets is the most beautiful being on Earth, and luckily he can quite often come to their rescue so of course he is also quite adored.

Mind you, Kvothe is not without his ~flaws. He's lived on the streets for a long time when he was young, he's very poor (they beat you over the head with his one), he also immediately squanders his money whenever he gets some, and he can be quite stupid.
The worst thing though, is that he can be incredibly obnoxious and pretentious at times, and it's no wonder so many other students and teachers can't stand him.

None of these things were apparent at the start of the story though, and I'm not sure what about it made me unable to really get into it. Because I quite like first person POVs (if well done). They can make it easier for me to really get into and understand the character. Yet for some reason in this case it just felt very distant, and I never felt that connection. It might have been because the story is being told to us, rather than happening in current time, but I don't really know.

There's other little things too. I mentioned that they beat us over the head with the fact that Kvothe is poor. They mention at least three times that “You wouldn't understand if you've never been poor” and it just comes across as really condescending. The exact same sentence also appears, but it's replaced with “if you've never been a musician”. It's just weird.
The chapters also frequently end with some ominous sentence like “This would be the last time this guy would tell this story” or “Too bad I'd never see him again”, and sure, such things are quite effective when used moderately. But after the third time in a short while it just makes me roll my eyes. I realize that these specific things are purely nitpicking though.

Aside from Kvothe, I found not much other things to like. Surprisingly, I actually quite liked Denna. Her character isn't ~nice, but I find her interesting. I do not like the pedestal Kvothe puts her on though, or how absurdly obsessive he tends to get.
I'm sure there's other things that were fine, but I can't seem to think of them right now.