The Wise Man's Fear

On day two, Kvothe tells how his feud with Ambrose gets him charged with consorting with demons. He wins in court but ends up in debt. In Severen he earns Maer Alveron's trust by foiling a poisoning plot. Hunting bandits in the Eld, he spends time in the Fae realm with Felurian, and the Cthaeh tells him the bandit leader was Cinder of the Chandrian. He trains with the Adem and earns the sword Caesura. The Maer pardons him and pays his tuition. In the present, two soldiers rob the inn and Kvothe loses the fight. The book closes with him taking one single perfect step.

1. Behind the scenesAlmost a thousand pages

   The US hardcover runs 994 pages. It still debuted at No. 1 on the New York Times fantasy list and later topped the hardcover fiction list.

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2. Behind the scenesOne year became four

   Rothfuss promised a book a year, but revisions delayed the sequel. The first draft reached his editor in May 2009, and the book didn't come out until March 2011.

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3. Behind the scenesGeorge R. R. Martin approved

   Martin named it the best fantasy book he read in 2011. He said he gulped it down in a day, staying up almost to dawn.

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4. Behind the scenesA prize-winning excerpt

   An excerpt that became part of this book, The Road to Levinshir, won the Writers of the Future contest in 2002. That win helped Rothfuss sell the series.

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5. ReferenceThe game left the page

   Tak, the board game played in the story, became a real game in 2016, designed by Rothfuss and James Ernest.

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