Eldest (Inheritance, Book 2)
by Christopher Paolini
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Book Reviews of Eldest (Inheritance, Book 2)
Book Review: In defense of the ravers, the haters, and everyone in between
Summary: 2 Stars
Do not allow my opinion of this book to influence your opinion. Stick with the facts, and here they are:
Yes, this novel does support a higher end vocabulary. Did it bother me, no, because in fact, Eldest's vocabulary is much more toned down compared to Eragon. The words no longer seem horribly out of place.
Is Eldest long and boring? Well, judging by page numbers, yes, Eldest is huge, but it reads quickly. Boring? Well, that depends on how much you read, how often, and on what level.
(1)For a casual reader, this novel may come across as quite good. Also, if your genre range is wide, Eldest will be quite interesting, especially if it is one of your newer glimpses in fantasy.
(2)For some one who does not read much, and who picked up this book from the pressure of friends or the hype, this book will definitely be long, and maybe even a tedious read.
(3)But for the avid readers like myself, Eldest, though able to be devoured in a day or two, Eldest will most likely be boring, especially near the end. This is especially true for the extremes of fantasy fanatics, like myself.
Another issue, the rip offs and cliché...does it effect the story?
Scenario 1: A little, the book will probably get a 4 star out of you, as of right now.
Scenario 2: No way, dude! Eldest will seem like one of the best things you have ever read. It may have even spurred you into liking reading more.
Scenario 3: Yes, hands down. The clichés and rip offs will make shake your head, and for the Fantasy Fanatics, it will make your stomach churn and your heart break as you see your favorite novels murdered.
Another issue, the blandness of characters.
1: They will not make you ball your eyes out, but they may get a chuckle out of you, make you a little proud...as if the feeling were second hand.
2: You could think that they were standing in front of you.
3: Groans, moans, and 'where have I seen this before?' The hero with a failing love interest, the elf princess with black hair, the dwarves with a fondness for beer...
The next problem: the writing itself...
1: You may be impressed with the description, and be enchanted with Paolini's--unusual--use of words
2: It will probably loose you; it is not for light reading, but then again, it is less complicated than Tolkien, because it is all squished into long sentences.
3: It will come across as gaudy and trying to hard. You will notice things like the BPD--block paragraph description, in which an author dedicated a paragraph solely to the description of one thing, only for you to forget it.
And that, I believe, it is it for now, but here is one last thing. Should you read Eldest...should you buy it or borrow it?
1: You should read Eldest. While it will not be the best thing you have ever read in your life, it may be a favorite of yours. Depending on how much fantasy intrigues you, buy it or borrow it.
2: What are you waiting for? This could be a nice introduction into fantasy, though I will note, there are better. May I suggest waiting for the paperback version, or borrowing it?
3: Stay away, unless you want a few laughs. I mean, it is amusing to read, and even fun...in a strange sort of way.
Note: by casual, I mean, it takes more than a week to read a novel. By 'not reading much', I mean that you are perfectly capable of not reading, that you have other, better things to do. By avid, I mean not unknown to be up til 3 am or to down a book in a day.
Book Review: Near-plagiarism never had it so good
Summary: 1 Stars
I am a children's/YA librarian; thus, it is my job to be "up" on what is popular with kids. Aside from that, I LOVE to read children's and YA books, especially fantasy. In fact, I've been reading fantasy since I was about 8 years old, and I've read many classic children's fantasy series-- like Lewis', Cooper's, and Alexander's-- as well as some classic adult books.
Never in all my life have I read a series so undeserving of its praise. Normally, I am not so harsh on books, but this book and it's predecessor, "Eragon" are so mind-blowingly awful, it's amazing they ever saw print. Derivative? We've got your derivative right here! Why read Tolkien, McCaffrey and Le Guin when you can read Paolini! Oh, wait: because they're the originals that Paolini copied from! I predicted the end of the second book 1/4 of the way through "Eragon."
Also, to "bob," from "Jupiter, 5th settlement" who on September 13, felt that "This book is recieving to much unfair treatment:" here's a newsflash: "foreshadowing" is NOT "[t]aking some ideas from other books and using it in your own." Webster's Dictionary defines "foreshadow" as: "to represent, indicate, or typlify beforehand." Your definition of foreshadowing? I think that would most accurately be "plagiarism," since "plagiarize," the root of "plagiarism," means: "to steal and pass off (the ideas or words of another) as one's own." Hmm.... You might want to check your literary terms next time!
At the library where I work we're not supposed to impose our opinions of materials on people unless specifically asked. I jokingly told a staff member that I wish I could have rubberbanded "Eldest" to "Return of the Jedi" with a note that read: "Why read the book when you can watch the movie!" Ah well... At least many people seem to agree with me!
ETA: To Dan Carerra: maybe you should actually READ my review before commenting on it. According to Webster's-- and if you want to argue with Webster's by all means, go ahead-- plagiarism IS "stealing ideas." What did Paolini do when he had his little farmboy from a remote part of Alagaesia set off on this adventure accompanied by a wise old former dragonrider? Hmm, let's think: plagiarize? You got it! Yes, he didn't call his farmboy Luke or his mentor Obi-Wan, but the fact remains the same: he stole the idea. And he stole many ideas from Tolkien, too, but I'm not going to go into that since so many have said it so much better than I ever could.
Good ideas are original: yes, many take inspiration from other places, but when the inspiration is so completely obvious, that's when it becomes plagiarism. (And incidentally, I was simply trying to point out to a previous reviewer that he obviously had no idea what foreshadowing meant, since his definition of foreshadowing was that of plagiarism.) So the bottom line is: argue with Webster's about the definition, don't argue with me about the execution of the definition. Copying is copying, no matter how you swing it.
And people can read whatever they like, I don't care. I want people, kids especially, to read. (Heck, I read many poorly written books when I was young.) What I'm after is for them to realize how terrible these books are. It's one thing to laude a terrible book and call it a classic, it's quite another to read the book, enjoy it, and then go off and find better books to read. That's what I'm hoping happens here, and that's what I try to encourage. For every kid who tells me they like Paolini, I try and give them much better authors to read, thus encouraging reading, but hopefully improving the quality as well.
Book Review: There's a reason why there aren't many published teen authors...
Summary: 1 Stars
...It's because most teens who write haven't got enough experience, in life or writing, to be publishable.
Of course, there are still plenty of teen writers who are remarkably talented, and many of those will go on to be Names in the business. But most teens haven't honed their writing far enough to be ready to publish something. Case in point? Chris Paolini, and this book.
Many have lauded his achievement in writing and publishing his first novel during his teen years (although I find the '15-years-old' line rather suspicious-sounding. It's said he STARTED the first one at age 15, which could mean practically anything). Unfortunately, Eragon proved to be a disappointment. As many pointed out, it was written by a teenager and it READ like it was written by a teenager. The author was unable to hide his inexperience behind the innumerable stolen ideas in the book, and as a result it was barely readable. The entire production stank of immaturity and the arrogance that strikes many beginning authors, who somehow end up thinking that, just because they have written a book, they are the gods' gift to literature.
And now... here comes the sequel. This one was not written by a teen, as CP is now in his twenties.
...However, it still reads like the work of a teenager. The sentences are poorly structured, the characterisation and plotting are amateurish, and there is little internal logic to hold it all together. Regrettably, the excessive praise lavished upon the previous book had the effect of making the writer even more overconfident than before, as a result of which he set about trying to make Eldest sound more 'mature' than Eragon. This involved cramming the book full of pointless politics and lame psuedo-philosophy, which meant that Eldest manages to commit one of the Deadly Sins of books: it's boring. In writing, if you can't make a book As Good As Tolkien, you can at the very least make it entertaining to read. In the end, that's what readers really want. But Eldest is not entertaining, on any level whatsoever. The pacing is incredibly slow, the characters are lackluster, the dialogue ghastly at best. The author has inserted some 'big words' into the text (for example, the word 'stymied' appears in the first chapter, followed by 'insensate' a few chapters later), but they are painfully obvious and, rather than causing readers to applaud, they are more likely to see them reaching for their dictionaries. The story is nothing that hasn't been done a million times before, and the ending is so predictable as to be laughable.
This book has no redeeming features, and should not be recommended to anyone. Nor should it be held up as an example of how teens write. Most teenage writing is superior to this, and is at the very least original. This book, however, is very obviously the work of an ignorant and uneducated writer, and does not belong anywhere near the literary greats.
PS: However, I see no reason to stop comparing it with Tolkien. As far as I can tell, Tolkien is only there so he can have every inferior writer favourably compared to him to make them look better.
PPS: Okay, I think I can finally settle the debate about whether the line 'Search your feelings, you know it to be true' is actually in there or not. The line as it appears is 'Look within yourself, you know it to be true'. Okay, so it's not a carbon copy like some claimed, but it's close enough that it rewrote itself in some readers' minds. Not surprising; CP changed it, but it's still obviously the same line, slightly altered. I find that pathetic.
Book Review: It's not just the author who should have his fingers broken...
Summary: 1 Stars
The editor deserves it too, in some ways more so than the author.
This book reads like a first draft - it's full of little mistakes and internal contradictions, repetitive dialogue and descriptions, and other things that didn't need to be there.
However, if this thing had been properly edited, these things would have been sorted out. But Eldest was not properly edited. In fact one has to wonder if it was edited at all.
An editor's job is to clean up manuscripts ready for publication, to tighten the plotting, make sure the characterisations are consistent, and basically polish things and get them up to standard. I recently finished the editing phase of my own first novel, and I remember very well the kinds of things my own editor said. For example, `this character only appears once and isn't important to the story; better remove the paragraph you used to describe him'. Which I did. And `okay, in Chapter One this thing was twice as tall as the heroine. Now it's seven feet tall. Which one is the right one? We need to make sure this is consistent'. Once again, that was fixed. If I hadn't had an editor to help me fix little things like that which I'd missed, the final manuscript would've gone to the typsetter's in a very sorry state.
My editor was very professional and competent, and obviously knew her stuff. And let me assure you that if she had been in charge of editing Eldest, some very pointed emails would have been sent to author's way.
Such as; `You've established that the elves are vegetarians, but toward the end of the book mention is made of Eragon's leather arm bracers, which the elves gave him. If they're vegetarian, where did they get the leather?'
And `Saphira's childish behaviour during the middle section of the book is completely at odds with her former personality. This needs revision'.
And `The repetition of "aye" in place of "yes" is annoying and does not add to the story. Please go through and delete all but a few of these.'
And `Making Eragon "become an elf" is a bad idea because it takes away his former vulnerability and makes him less sympathetic. Suggest we remove this section'.
And, first and most importantly; `The entire middle 300 pages or so are very dull and not really necessary to the overall story. You will have to remove them, sorry. I believe we could easily whittle this down to a couple of chapters at most. Efficiency of language and plotting are important!'
You get the idea. I don't know who Paolini's editor is, but he or she deserves to get the sack. No editor who knew their job would let such a badly edited manuscript go into print. Eldest is full of elemental errors which even the most innattentive of proofreaders should have spotted. After all, I spotted them, and I wasn't even being paid to do it.
The author of a book is rarely able to spot errors in their own work, since the level of personal involvement needed means that he or she simply cannot look at it objectively. It is more or less exactly the same as trying to examine your own personality from someone else's point of view: in other words it's a virtual impossibility.
So Christopher Paolini shouldn't really take the blame for making mistakes. His editor should be blamed for failing to spot and correct them. What was she thinking? WAS she thinking?
Don't blame Paolini for a badly edited book. He can take the blame for other things, like the stolen ideas, the nonexistent characterisations and the appalling dialogue. With a book like this, there's plenty of blame to go around.
Book Review: An excellent tale to while away the hours
Summary: 4 Stars
As most of us could tell with Earagon, it was an author's first book. There is nothing wrong with that. If you read all of Anne McCaffery's works you can see distinct differences between her early and later books.
So it was with this in mind that I got Eldest and started reading. I have to say that I found myself very pleasantly surprised. First off was that there were three words in this book that I had never seen before. I can't remember the last time an author used words I didn't already know. There were parts of the book that I didn't find fully fleshed out, but that happens in every book. When writing it is often common for the author to have things fully fleshed out in their mind but forget to make them as clear on paper.
Also, I'd imagine that when a book starts getting this long, things start to get cut. I think that may have happened a bit in this book with a few elements in the Elven forest, though I could be wrong.
I found the imagery to by stellar. I truly enjoy reading what I term 'high fantasy'. Most fantasy strives for elements of realism that place it somewhere between reality and absolute fantasy. Tolkien is (of course) one of the great examples of true high fantasy. A world that is a ship sailing through the stars, but then is made round to keep humans from reaching the undying lands in the west, etc...
Paolini strives to create high fantasy: hollow, ten mile high mountains and the like. Once you move into the realm of high fantasy your work has no choice but to reflect other works. The reason for this is that all mid and high fantasy draws from the same pool. Mid fantasy focuses on certain elements and expands on them, but high fantasy runs the whole gamut, thus you see elements that you often see in other stories, because high fantasy encompasses them all.
The trilogy is (as are most trilogies) analogous to a three act play. The second act is always slower than the first and third acts. The stage is set, the characters are introduced and now we settle in for development and the preparation of themes that will consume the third act.
It is obvious that (as pretty much all fantasy novels do) our hero will mature and overcome the great evil, after first overcoming their own boundaries. To do this the hero must begin to understand themselves, and that is what this book consists of.
In ringing opposition to many of the reviews here I will claim this book to be of a very high caliber. I strongly recommend it to any and all who appreciate high fantasy and when they finished reading LotR immediately went in search for more stories along the same vein.
I believe that this book rates a four, but only because it has to compete with things like Wizard's First Rule and other masterpieces of that nature. However, I will give it a five as I believe the people who have rated it a one are being emotional in some way. Not having a book deliver to you what you wish it to deliver is no reason to not give it the credit it is due.
Read every book with an open mind, not attempting to load it with your own expectations and desires for the outcome. If you expect every reading experience to contain something fresh that you have never seen before, you either have not read very many books (and thus will find many fresh things) or you are simply being unreasonable.
Purchase this book, sit back and enjoy a very well written tale with what I believe to be a compelling story and interesting characters.