Random Thoughts on "Eragon"

It just goes to show how important it is to preview a book before you read it. At the beginning of the book was a fairly detailed map of the terrritories where the story takes place, but what I didn't notice, to my chagrin, was that at the end of the book is a pronunciation glossary and a translation of some of the old language. I would have felt much less frustrated if I had noticed these things earlier in the story.

About the story... I see lots of similarities between Eragon and the Star Wars mythology, also that of Harry Potter. It all focuses around a reluctant hero, who has much to learn to accomplish his goals. He is fortunate to have many older, wiser people around him who help prepare him for the challenges ahead.

I can't help but feel that Eragon is destined to be a hero from the beginning. As this book is the first of a series (or maybe only 2) there is some of the history & much of the future that are not shared with the reader.

Paolini doles out the history of his created world in fragments, that create a fairly satifying picture when all the pieces are put together. I have to say, that the ending was a real cliff-hanger, and I am eager to read the next adventure to see what happens to Eragon and his dragon.

The Blank Page

The purpose of this blog is for me to record some of my thoughts and processes as I am reading.

This first entry will be about the book, Eragon by Christopher Paolini. I was familiar with the name of the book before I started, and I had learned from several students that it was a good story. My initial thoughts that it was about a dragon are result of the dragon pictured on the front cover.

The first chapter was both intruiging and frustrating. There was a lot of invented vocabulary. To my knowledge, there is no glossary to define or illustrate pronunciation. I'm definitely struggling. Clearly magic is involved.

Eragon's introduction is fabulous. Paolini does an excellent job of showing that he was already special before he encountered the stone.