That was comedy gold. Stanek and his army of sock-puppets descended on Rothfuss' Amazon pages and Wikipedia entry and attempted to wreck havoc until I detected the unmistakable whiff of Stanekness (he has a very identifiable form of diction) and brought it up on a couple of messageboards. Watching those reviews and sockpuppets vanishing quickly from Amazon shortly thereafter was quite entertaining.

I still don't get why he targetted Rothfuss though. Rothfuss has never mentioned Stanek in any way, shape or form. The other authors the sock-puppets were rating down were people like David Louis Edelman, who have posted blog entries ripping him a new one. The only conclusion I can come to is that Stanek was simply jealous that this new author had come out of nowhere and instantly scored a New York Times bestseller with his first book and attracted a massive fan following overnight. Plus he has a superior beard.