The Name of the Wind

After the death of his family, the hero is left alone and goes through several different worlds at once. At first, he has to survive without protection and home, then he has to earn a place at the University, where knowledge of magic coexists with strict discipline, poverty, and rivalry. He learns to earn money through music, to seek information about the Chandrian, and to understand what in old songs and scary stories might turn out to be true. Meanwhile, the present-day storyline develops: a tavern keeper named Kote speaks with a chronicler about his life, and gradually from this conversation a picture emerges of a man whom the world has turned into a myth.