Written by Christopher Paolini
Eldest picks up where the first book, Eragon, left off in the Inheritance Trilogy. We catch up with Eragon in Farthen Dur with the Varden and the Dwarves. What follows is a tale of nearly epic proportions. I say epic because at times the plot and pace seem to slow down quite a bit. I believe that the author might have been trying to flesh out the characters a bit more but didn’t quite succeed as well as he most likely hoped. Not to take anything away from him as it’s quite the feat to have published a second novel of this size by the time you’re twenty one, but it also seems like there are some things that a little experience would have helped him out with. A seeming lack of realism in places.
If you’ve read the first novel and any of the reviews of it, you know that there are some that have found similarities between these novels and the Lord of the Rings Trilogy. I must admit that while I own the Rings Trilogy, I have yet to actually read it. I have seen the movies though. I know it’s no excuse. The similarities are certainly there.
I don’t have a problem with that. In any one genre, there are very seldom any stories that are completely unique. Some similarites exist between that story and some other story. The best authors do it. Of course, I believe that they also tend to use more obscure stories to borrow from, but they do it nonetheless. What truly makes a story is how the author weaves(Thanks Guy Gavriel Kay for that concept) the plot, characters, and story elements together.
The author acheives that here. He makes you look past the more glaring similarities into the characters and story that he is weaving and you become immersed. Paolini has a talent that few have. And at a early age at that. Look for much more exciting literature from him in the future.
Pick up Eldest at Amazon.
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About Shane Ede
I don’t blame you for not getting through LOTR. The thing about “epic” books and series: They have a massive scale, they’re very highly regarded, they’re very long, and many parts are VERY dry. The thing about spending your life creating an intricately detailed fantasy world is, you need a lot of pages to tell everyone about it. Which means a lot of boring areas of the story, even with including 50 pages of appendices. I got through the Lord of the Rings series, but I can’t honestly say I enjoyed reading it. I enjoyed the world Tolkien created for us, and I enjoyed the story, but the actual book, in its 1000s-of-pages entirety… not so much.