I’m aware of the distinct lack of posts produced over the last month. I could blame work, sleep, and a myriad of other things, but it just comes down to laziness. For this post I’m going to give a critique over a book I’ve read, Eragon by Christopher Paolini. This is going to be mostly a list of what he did wrong and what he did right.
******SPOILERS******
Let us start with the Good:
1) The World of Alagaesia is well crafted. It has good, solid structure and is a believable world (as far as fantasy is concerned). It has a history that is well developed and plays a part in the current events of the story. I did have issues with the timeline of some events, but it was mostly confusion as to when things happened in proximity to the present. Which is a problem to be expected when dealing with immortal characters.
2) There are a multitude of characters that are incredibly interesting, Angela, Brom, Azjihad, Murtag, and more. They have back-story and personalities that are easy to accept, though sometimes infuriating (Brom’s favorite line is “I’ll keep that information to myself.”)
3) The plot is entertaining. It isn’t too deep or complicated, and I easily predicted how several events were going to happen. It really doesn’t go anywhere original or spectacular, but it does a good job getting there.
4) Saphira is Awesome. I now want a Dragon.
Now for the Bad a.k.a. The Three Big E’s:
1)Eragon
Eragon is one of the worst main characters ever, or rather he is presented horribly. He is the biggest whiner I have ever seen. This not to say that his life is easy, or that he accomplishes his goals with minimal effort, but he does WHINE ALL THE FREAKING TIME!
Honestly, the kid is in a constant state of, “Woe is Me.” Do not let your characters be Angst ridden. They are not helping your story, they are only bogging it down. Eragon is almost constantly complaining about something or another. Now, some of these episodes into Angst can be expected, such as the death of his uncle. Even to an extent, the death of Brom, but he makes the exact same complaints and cries of turmoil. The scene that makes me want to throttle Eragon though is after the climactic battle, Eragon has received a nasty scar across his back. Now I am aware that this wound would hurt a lot, but first of all the wound isn’t visible if you have on a shirt. Second, it isn’t particularly life threatening or maiming. Third, he killed a shade (demon-possessed man) and that was all he got from it. The dude is a hero of legend now, and all he got from it was a B.A. scar. His response, “I’M DEFORMED!” (Apply palm directly to own face.) Over all Eragon isn’t that bad of an M.C. He does show his growth and his development into being a hero, but only physically and mentally. He completely bypasses the emotional aspect and stays stagnant since the beginning. This could be acceptable if this lack of emotional development affected his abilities, but it seems to not do so in anyway.
Learn from this Future Writers: Develop your characters evenly, or make their weaknesses actually affect their entire being. And don’t make characters angsty, it doesn’t help. Find the fine line between angst and actual issues.
2) The Elves
Dear Lord, please give me the strength.
I used to like elves. Really I did, I thought they were neat and an interesting race. They are powerful in magic, wise, and lived forever. I hate Elves now. I wondered why a friend of mine hated elves so much (He has also read Eragon) and now I know why. The Elves of Eragon are a Mary-Sue race. There is no getting around it, they are. Not only are they over-powered as crap, but they seem to have no flaws what so ever.
I say they have no flaws and they are over powered, but really, that is all told. It is only shown during the training between Ariya and Eragon. We see how out matched he is, but other than that there’s no indication that she is more powerful than him or anyone else in anything. We are told many times that elves are vastly superior to men in every way, but Ariya and her guards are taken down by a few Urgals at the beginning of the book (granted it was an ambush (Which they should have seen coming), but they still should have been able to retaliate). Later in the book, Eragon and Murtag handle not just Urgals, but the Super Urgals (Whose names escape me) with more success and after days of hard travel. It makes no sense! The power ratio between the characters is so out of whack that it is laughable. To quote Vegeta from DBZ Abridged, “Power Levels are Bull S***!”
And furthermore, IF the elves are so amazing, then why don’t they just attack the King and end it? If the weakest of elves is stronger than the mightiest of men, then why is there even a problem in the first place? This is A HUGE plot error that should have been corrected.
Learn from this Future Writers: If someone is asking these kinds of questions or could as these kinds of questions involving a plot hole. FIX IT IMMEDIATELY! Further, do not even attempt to make a perfect race. Even a perfect race has flaws. The elves could have been strong magically, but weak physically. Or even have them be all around superior to men, but lack creativity and out of the box thinking. Something to give them an Achilles Heel.
3) Errors
As stated above there is a massive plot error with the elves. There are a few others, but these are small and mostly have to do with pacing, and timeline. The biggest of these errors is the pointlessness of the first half of the book. All it does is give Eragon time to grow stronger and for us to wait for Brom to die. Other than that, there is not point of having him chase down the Ra’zac. Sure it gives us time to develop a connection with Brom, but that could have been better done during a time traveling towards the Vardin or having him trained in secret. It would be one thing to have seen Eragon actually kill one of the Ra’zac. If the idea of having a character grow is important to the story, then you need to give us bench marks of when that happens. Watch egoraptors megaman vs megaman x video for instructions on how to do this effectively.
Brom is an overused tool of convenience as far as keeping the plot under control. When ever there comes a point where the author wants to stop us from learning too much too soon, he has Brom say, “I will keep that information to myself for now.” Murtag does a similar thing, but his story is less important to the plot and his excuses are more viable.
Lastly Paollini’s style needed work. I’m aware he was only 16 when he wrote Eragon, but he needed to mix up his word choice. I even do this sometimes with the word sprint. I’m a runner as well and I like the word sprint. That doesn’t mean I need to use it every time I don’t want to use run.
Learn from this future writers, get more creative with your suspense and mystery than having a mentor who doesn’t tell everything intentionally and for no real reason. Also have there be a reason for every action you write down. And vary your word choice. Thesaurus….get one!
meanderingexperiences 