[Reading] I'm going to make a few enemies here...

[jon_chaisson]

I got about twenty or so pages into Christopher Paolini's Eragon and I had to put it down. Now, don't get me wrong, I thought the premise was good, but the style was just irritating me too much to want to continue.

I have to admit it's for two reasons, one of style and one for selfish reasons. First it annoyed me because, yes, I know it was written when he was what--fifteen or sixteen?--and yes, I know it's basically a kid's book, but it still bothered me that it read like a writer who really hadn't learned his chops yet. How do I know this? Because the style of writing is very much what my style sounded like when I wrote at that age. Very much along the lines of:

Character did this. He went there. He looked like this. He was wearing that. He thought this.

Next paragraph: Character thought this. He said something to someone.

Next paragraph...and so on.

Just very sparse, three-sentence paragraphs and a lot of boring noun-verb sentences. I really wish I could have gotten into it more, but it was just too damn frustrating to read.

Which brings me to the selfish reason: Hell, I wrote and the finished version of the IWN at that age back in 1987. Had I but known Eragon would get past the editors, that damn novel would have been finished and out of my head YEARS ago. ;)

Comments

Re: Had I but known Eragon would get past the editors, that damn novel would have been finished...

[urnesha.livejournal.com]

I definitely think it's worse than the Belgariad books. Not that the matter are that complex themselves but at least they can be read and enjoyed (though after about the 4th one it gets tiring) but the Eragon series just has very little imagination and poor writing. I read the first to support him and the second cause I wanted to see if he got any better with age.. but as the answer to the latter was no, I have no intention of buying or reading the third.

Re: Had I but known Eragon would get past the editors, that damn novel would have been finished...

[kaisilverwolf.livejournal.com]

It wasn't so much that she thought it was "as bad" as the belgariad books, since both j and i love them and have read them many times. It was that they read as if he had read them and then written his book. the writing style was similar, i believe was her complaint - too similar and without the fun bits that make Eddings books readable.

But you'd have to ask her for the exact description.