Eldest
Under the cut is my review of Eldest and because I am tired and silly, it ends up being a rant/essay about epic fantasy in general. If you're curious about my opinions about epic fantasy and don't give a damn about Eldest, skip down to the last large paragraph.
You often pick up books and reflect on what they COULD have been. How the potential was there yet wasn't fulfilled. How there were so many opportunities to create something great and yet... it didn't. This is the experience I had with Eldest, the second book in the Inheritance trilogy. After reading Eragon, the first book, I had a similar reaction but found it to be fun in the least. After hearing that the author was planning on breaking from the typical fantasy archetypes in the second installment, I decided to give it a chance. Overwhelmingly negative reviews made me shy about picking up my copy for about five months, but eventually I bit the bullet and picked up the near 700 page monster I got for Christmas.
I did not see much breaking from the fantasy archetypes. Sure there were changes here and there (especially with the Orc-like Urgals) but it did not change the fact that I often felt like I was reading a poor copy of another man's work. I would enjoy my Eldest reading experience, only to be slapped in the face by a line, a character, or a plot twist that seemed to be either straight out of Lord of the Rings or Star Wars. These moments would not only cause me to roll my eyes but it would completely interrupt my involvement with the characters, almost like a reminder that, although Eldest may seem NICE at times, in the end it is nothing special or original. It is merely a rehashing of old ideas and adds nothing to the fantasy genre, except for a really cool cover. The plot twists were never surprising. Instead they left me with an overall feeling of "bleh-ness" you get over watching a mediocre made for TV-movie.
The writing, although far from amazing, was pretty solid. Unlike Dan Brown, Christopher Paolini can sting a sentence together without tripping all over himself. Unfortunately, this was ruined by sprinkling in over dramatic descriptions or lines of dialogue. More times that I could count I found myself physically shaking the book and going “WHY! Why did you have to add in that line! It was FINE the way it was!” I think if you want to add drama to your writing, there is nothing wrong in that, but when it is used so often that it loses its intended weight, you soon find yourself not caring too much about it at all. As a result, you end up caring less and less about the characters and more about how many pages you have left to read.
I did like the use of multiple plot lines, although I felt that it could have been better. Here we see not only Eragon's story but his cousin Roran's. The problem comes with the occasional random passage about Nausada that come off random and unneeded. I found myself actually enjoying Roran's story more than Eragon's because it felt less forced, less overly epic and show offish. Part of the reason I read books is because I love reading about the stories of different people, even if they may be fictional characters. Eragon's story, which mirror's the path of Luke Skyewalker's journey in the second original Star Wars movie almost to a T (just add some romance), did not have much to draw me in. Roran's story seemed much more personal and interesting. I found myself rooting for him and I have hopes that things will go well for him in book three.
There are a few positive things to mention about this book. I do not find reading it to be a waste of my time. Although some readers have claimed that it was boring, I felt that it was pretty well paced, although it could have been 25-50 pages shorter. Also, from reading the descriptions I knew that this would translate EXCELLENTLY to film. From serene shots of the elven homeland to the epic battle scenes, I often found myself thinking "wow this would look great in a movie." There's no doubt in my mind that they will be turning this into a film, since Eragon: The Movie is coming out this winter, and I look foreword to seeing it.
I think that I will probably end up reading Eldest once more, before the third book comes out, but beyond that, it will probably just collect dust on my shelf, being lent out to friends when needed. I do not think it was a horrible book. I do not think, as Entertainment Weekly proclaimed, that it was the worst book of the year. I just see it as another fantasy novel trying to fill the shoes of the great J.R.R. Tolkien. What fantasy writers need to realize these days is they don't need to shoot quite so high. They do not need to write sweeping epics involving all of the typical fantasy elements to write something meaningful. Instead they need to learn to separate their own story from the ones they read and love, creating a good story that is as much their own as possible. It does not need to be epic. It does not need to involve dramatic dragons fights or long speeches about the meaning of life or the existence (or in this case, the lack) of a God. Instead, all that we as readers ask is you create characters that act like real people, flaws and all. Although they may be placed in extraordinary situations, they never lose their element of realism. That's how books about dragons can touch us in the same way as a story about a love relationship between two ordinary people, because the characters act like we do. Fantasy writers don’t always seem to realize this, and often sacrifice characterization for writing exciting and BIG plots. As a result, they fall to stereotypes: the gruff but well meaning dwarf with his ax, the serene and beautiful elves with their mastery of quickness and archery, the princess that needs to be saved, the wise older teacher who seems to have the answers for almost everything, the farm boy that saves the universe…
Fantasy readers need to realize that this method simply does not work. After all which book of the 20th and now 21st century will survive until the next? Virginia Woolf’s “To the Lighthouse” or “Eldest.”
Sleeeppp
You often pick up books and reflect on what they COULD have been. How the potential was there yet wasn't fulfilled. How there were so many opportunities to create something great and yet... it didn't. This is the experience I had with Eldest, the second book in the Inheritance trilogy. After reading Eragon, the first book, I had a similar reaction but found it to be fun in the least. After hearing that the author was planning on breaking from the typical fantasy archetypes in the second installment, I decided to give it a chance. Overwhelmingly negative reviews made me shy about picking up my copy for about five months, but eventually I bit the bullet and picked up the near 700 page monster I got for Christmas.
I did not see much breaking from the fantasy archetypes. Sure there were changes here and there (especially with the Orc-like Urgals) but it did not change the fact that I often felt like I was reading a poor copy of another man's work. I would enjoy my Eldest reading experience, only to be slapped in the face by a line, a character, or a plot twist that seemed to be either straight out of Lord of the Rings or Star Wars. These moments would not only cause me to roll my eyes but it would completely interrupt my involvement with the characters, almost like a reminder that, although Eldest may seem NICE at times, in the end it is nothing special or original. It is merely a rehashing of old ideas and adds nothing to the fantasy genre, except for a really cool cover. The plot twists were never surprising. Instead they left me with an overall feeling of "bleh-ness" you get over watching a mediocre made for TV-movie.
The writing, although far from amazing, was pretty solid. Unlike Dan Brown, Christopher Paolini can sting a sentence together without tripping all over himself. Unfortunately, this was ruined by sprinkling in over dramatic descriptions or lines of dialogue. More times that I could count I found myself physically shaking the book and going “WHY! Why did you have to add in that line! It was FINE the way it was!” I think if you want to add drama to your writing, there is nothing wrong in that, but when it is used so often that it loses its intended weight, you soon find yourself not caring too much about it at all. As a result, you end up caring less and less about the characters and more about how many pages you have left to read.
I did like the use of multiple plot lines, although I felt that it could have been better. Here we see not only Eragon's story but his cousin Roran's. The problem comes with the occasional random passage about Nausada that come off random and unneeded. I found myself actually enjoying Roran's story more than Eragon's because it felt less forced, less overly epic and show offish. Part of the reason I read books is because I love reading about the stories of different people, even if they may be fictional characters. Eragon's story, which mirror's the path of Luke Skyewalker's journey in the second original Star Wars movie almost to a T (just add some romance), did not have much to draw me in. Roran's story seemed much more personal and interesting. I found myself rooting for him and I have hopes that things will go well for him in book three.
There are a few positive things to mention about this book. I do not find reading it to be a waste of my time. Although some readers have claimed that it was boring, I felt that it was pretty well paced, although it could have been 25-50 pages shorter. Also, from reading the descriptions I knew that this would translate EXCELLENTLY to film. From serene shots of the elven homeland to the epic battle scenes, I often found myself thinking "wow this would look great in a movie." There's no doubt in my mind that they will be turning this into a film, since Eragon: The Movie is coming out this winter, and I look foreword to seeing it.
I think that I will probably end up reading Eldest once more, before the third book comes out, but beyond that, it will probably just collect dust on my shelf, being lent out to friends when needed. I do not think it was a horrible book. I do not think, as Entertainment Weekly proclaimed, that it was the worst book of the year. I just see it as another fantasy novel trying to fill the shoes of the great J.R.R. Tolkien. What fantasy writers need to realize these days is they don't need to shoot quite so high. They do not need to write sweeping epics involving all of the typical fantasy elements to write something meaningful. Instead they need to learn to separate their own story from the ones they read and love, creating a good story that is as much their own as possible. It does not need to be epic. It does not need to involve dramatic dragons fights or long speeches about the meaning of life or the existence (or in this case, the lack) of a God. Instead, all that we as readers ask is you create characters that act like real people, flaws and all. Although they may be placed in extraordinary situations, they never lose their element of realism. That's how books about dragons can touch us in the same way as a story about a love relationship between two ordinary people, because the characters act like we do. Fantasy writers don’t always seem to realize this, and often sacrifice characterization for writing exciting and BIG plots. As a result, they fall to stereotypes: the gruff but well meaning dwarf with his ax, the serene and beautiful elves with their mastery of quickness and archery, the princess that needs to be saved, the wise older teacher who seems to have the answers for almost everything, the farm boy that saves the universe…
Fantasy readers need to realize that this method simply does not work. After all which book of the 20th and now 21st century will survive until the next? Virginia Woolf’s “To the Lighthouse” or “Eldest.”
Sleeeppp