A Quick Review of Eragon

by Diamondo

Ok, so here I am, an administrator on this hate site. But I gotta tell ya, I actually enjoyed Eragon. Were there flaws? Sure. Was it cliched, and on re-reading it, do I find it lacking? Yup. But when I started reading it the first time, I liked it solely because of Paolini’s age.

I knew he was my age when he wrote it, and this made me excited. Having a shallow, jealous dark side like all humans, I occasionally find myself comparing someone else to me. And I loved reading another work by a young person and measuring it with my own.

So, there you have the reason. Now on to the review. Obviously, we have the farmboy who discovers Big Things, has an old mentor, finds out only he can save the world, blah blah blah. You know, I’m actually glad for Saphira. If Eragon had an uber-magic sword or amulet or crap like that instead of Saphira, I doubt I would’ve continued reading.

Oh wait…..he does have a sword. Well, you know what I mean.

Anyway, stuff happens, he has to rescue a beautiful maiden, kill some bad dude, he does, and there is much rejoicing. Some of the characters, like Brom and Saphira and Murtagh, I liked. Others, like Arya, annoyed me to no end. I was waiting for her to die just before he rescues her, but let’s get real. This is contrived fantasy we’re talking about.

Speaking of contrived fantasy, elves and dwarves and such be here. Now, that did piss me off the first time I read it. Come on, you Tolkien wannabes, stop copying and come up with your own damn races. That goes for the Urgals, too. The one original aspect I did see in Eragon was Solembum – the Werecat idea was a really cool one (Update - I have since been informed by a reliable source that even the werecat is not original. There is a character in Garth Nix's Abhorsen trilogy named Mogget who is much like Solembum). And I want to know more: does Solembum struggle between human and cat forms like a werewolf, or what? Unfortunately, Paolini figures Solembum is too cool to need any extra detail, and so instead we’re left with dwarves and elves that we’ve seen over and over.

So there you have it. This was fun for me the first time around, although it’s worn down by now. If you wanna delve into detail, there are plenty of other articles on this site.

All in all, worth perhaps a light read, maybe for educational purposes, but don’t spend your money. Get it from the library or a friend.