(By Ellie:)
So I should be doing homework....or something more productive, like laundry, but I have to get this off my chest:
Someday I'd like to meet Christopher Paolini, perhaps while he's walking down the street, and when he least expects it, punch him as hard as I possibly can in the face.
Why, You may ask, do I want to punch Paolini in the face?
Because! his book series was the greatest disappointment in my entirety of reading!
You see, I love dragons. My room is decorated with dragons and a large chunk of my art is dedicated to dragons. I've wanted to read his books for a while but it wasn't until recently that I've had the time. So I started reading his series in May and I just now finished.
His first book I felt like, "Okay so you can tell this was written by a sixteen year old." But hey, no biggie, I was told by several other people that you gotta trudge through the first book to get to the second which was supposed to be better.
it was not.
Oh....Kay. Before I go off on all the reasons I didn't like his books, I'll mention the things I did like:
I liked the dragon Saphira, she was at least a fairly interesting character, my bias coming from the fact that I like dragons. I also liked the story of Roran and his escape from the Ra'zac and the survival of Carvahal, it kept me interested (page turner). I liked the idea of the dragon and it's rider sharing a consciousness and being equals, instead of some guy taming a dragon and riding it around like it's his pet. Oh and Angela was a fairly interesting character.
Now the reasons for wanting to punch Paolini in the face:
One: his writing style. His dialog is similar to his narration. Although there are a few characters who have a different way of speaking (Angela, sometimes Saphira), for the most part everyone has the same dialog and says similar things. I suppose I could pull out a few examples from the book but I'm lazy.
Oh! and how he uses descriptions. He'll describe the tiniest, most unimportant shit, like the shadows on his knuckles, the way a sunrise looks, the way the sap dribbles off a tree and bla and bla and bla and bla and bla. I think there's a way to do description which helps your reader to see what it is you are describing all the while giving them the liberty to have their own picture in their head. And quite honestly you don't need to describe a sunrise in explicit detail. Everyone has seen one at least one.
Two: the character Ayra... I wouldn't cry if she dropped dead, you know, just in the middle of the story. So, anyways, Eragon falls in love with this elf warrior and, well, she has the dullest personality out of everyone in the book. It would be like falling in love with an angry stump. A bitter, angry, sad little stump protruding from the ground. She hardly laughs, smiles, or does anything for that matter other than fight and be angry. Quite honestly, I'd like to know how many guys would fall for someone so boring and angry just because she's a hot elf with a tattoo.....uh I might be mistaken.
Three: The Urgals vs. Raz'ac. So the series has like two bad guy groups, the brutish Urgals and the dreadful Raz'ac. What I liked about the book was that Oromis and Glaedr, Eragon, and Saphira's mentors, teach them both that the Urgals are not necessarily bad evil creatures, just simply misunderstood. He explains to the hot-headed Eragon that it's not right to judge them, for having a different culture and bla bla bla and that they do not deserve to be driven to extinction.
BUT FUCK THE RA'ZAC! kill them all, they're evil bitches they are! In fact Eragon you should wipe them off the face of Alaglasea!
Ahem..
Four: Eragon gets to celebrate with the elves the blood oath celebration, in which he is given a gift that restores his body and makes him look elfy... Yay.
In the celebration there are a set of twin elf ladies, who get naked and show off their--get this--Rainbow dragon tattoo. Rainbow....Dragon.....Tattoo. Singular.
They then dance and the dragon tattoo comes to life and blesses Eragon. But seriously... A shimmering Rainbow Dragon Tattoo? Does anyone else think that sounds incredibly cheesy? It makes me constipated it's so cheesy! Oh other cheesy things
Five: The Ancient language. So this language is like cheating, It makes it too easy to write the story. So how the language works is that whenever someone speaks in this language they have to tell the truth, and if you promise something in this language you can't go back on it. So basically the bad guys, never really have their own motives, the reason why they do bad things, is because the one bad guy Galbatorix, has forced them to swear loyalty to him in the ancient language. Basically if something difficult arrises in the plot Paolini just has to say..."well they swore in the ancient language." Grrrrrrrrrr! So Hitler was able to kill a shit ton of people with his Nazis, do you think they swore in some ancient language?
Six: The gore. Alright so I think a lot of Epic fantasy writers look up to Tolkien and his works because he really set the scene for how we view fantasy, including elves, dwarves and the like. He's also a pretty good writer and story teller. Thing about Tolkien is that he himself was a soldier in world war one and lived through world war two. And yet in his writing he never describes the battles in explicit detail. You watch the movies and the battle scenes are epic, you read the books and they almost seem diminished.
Paolini hasn't gone to war. I'm pretty sure he hasn't killed anyone. But he's fine with going into explicit detail on every battle scene or gory event in his books. One particular scene that stands out in my mind, is when bloodthirsty Roran is fighting in battle, and he's practically fighting all by himself with an injured shoulder and leg, and somehow he ends up standing on a hill twenty feet high composed of dead bodies, bodies of the soldiers he killed. All of them who probably swore to Galbatorix in the stupid ancient language. (that's convenient)
Eragon and Arya kill a group of soldiers with their bare hands, one of which pleaded for his life before Eragon killed him. Of course they go to battle a bunch more times and kill some more, and then they kill a little bit more. Towards the end of Brisingr, In the last battle of the book, Eragon is described as being "surrounded by a mist of blood".
I'd honestly like to take Paolini, stick a sword in his hand, ship him overseas to fight in the military and see how well he can hack someone to bits.
It's not that a little bit of gore is a bad thing, and he does mention the twinge of guilt his characters have for killing people, but I feel that he describes it to such a great detail, that it's just immature. I'm not sure how his books have gotten to be so popular, because he writes like a guy who plays too many video games, or maybe a pampered home-schooled rich kid....tell me if I'm close?
In the end I think my question is, will I read the last of the Inheritance Cycle? Hmm maybe. As long as I get to throw the book at his head.
(Anybody have some suggestions of other fantasies series I might actually like? I need to cleanse my brain of all this cheese, corn and gore.)
So I should be doing homework....or something more productive, like laundry, but I have to get this off my chest:
Someday I'd like to meet Christopher Paolini, perhaps while he's walking down the street, and when he least expects it, punch him as hard as I possibly can in the face.
Why, You may ask, do I want to punch Paolini in the face?
Because! his book series was the greatest disappointment in my entirety of reading!
You see, I love dragons. My room is decorated with dragons and a large chunk of my art is dedicated to dragons. I've wanted to read his books for a while but it wasn't until recently that I've had the time. So I started reading his series in May and I just now finished.
His first book I felt like, "Okay so you can tell this was written by a sixteen year old." But hey, no biggie, I was told by several other people that you gotta trudge through the first book to get to the second which was supposed to be better.
it was not.
Oh....Kay. Before I go off on all the reasons I didn't like his books, I'll mention the things I did like:
I liked the dragon Saphira, she was at least a fairly interesting character, my bias coming from the fact that I like dragons. I also liked the story of Roran and his escape from the Ra'zac and the survival of Carvahal, it kept me interested (page turner). I liked the idea of the dragon and it's rider sharing a consciousness and being equals, instead of some guy taming a dragon and riding it around like it's his pet. Oh and Angela was a fairly interesting character.
Now the reasons for wanting to punch Paolini in the face:
One: his writing style. His dialog is similar to his narration. Although there are a few characters who have a different way of speaking (Angela, sometimes Saphira), for the most part everyone has the same dialog and says similar things. I suppose I could pull out a few examples from the book but I'm lazy.
Oh! and how he uses descriptions. He'll describe the tiniest, most unimportant shit, like the shadows on his knuckles, the way a sunrise looks, the way the sap dribbles off a tree and bla and bla and bla and bla and bla. I think there's a way to do description which helps your reader to see what it is you are describing all the while giving them the liberty to have their own picture in their head. And quite honestly you don't need to describe a sunrise in explicit detail. Everyone has seen one at least one.
Two: the character Ayra... I wouldn't cry if she dropped dead, you know, just in the middle of the story. So, anyways, Eragon falls in love with this elf warrior and, well, she has the dullest personality out of everyone in the book. It would be like falling in love with an angry stump. A bitter, angry, sad little stump protruding from the ground. She hardly laughs, smiles, or does anything for that matter other than fight and be angry. Quite honestly, I'd like to know how many guys would fall for someone so boring and angry just because she's a hot elf with a tattoo.....uh I might be mistaken.
Three: The Urgals vs. Raz'ac. So the series has like two bad guy groups, the brutish Urgals and the dreadful Raz'ac. What I liked about the book was that Oromis and Glaedr, Eragon, and Saphira's mentors, teach them both that the Urgals are not necessarily bad evil creatures, just simply misunderstood. He explains to the hot-headed Eragon that it's not right to judge them, for having a different culture and bla bla bla and that they do not deserve to be driven to extinction.
BUT FUCK THE RA'ZAC! kill them all, they're evil bitches they are! In fact Eragon you should wipe them off the face of Alaglasea!
Ahem..
Four: Eragon gets to celebrate with the elves the blood oath celebration, in which he is given a gift that restores his body and makes him look elfy... Yay.
In the celebration there are a set of twin elf ladies, who get naked and show off their--get this--Rainbow dragon tattoo. Rainbow....Dragon.....Tattoo. Singular.
They then dance and the dragon tattoo comes to life and blesses Eragon. But seriously... A shimmering Rainbow Dragon Tattoo? Does anyone else think that sounds incredibly cheesy? It makes me constipated it's so cheesy! Oh other cheesy things
- Brom in diamond tomb - CHEEZE
- The dwarves giant rose shaped gem thing - CORN
- the name: Saphira - Big serving of mac and CHEEZE!
- Riders having a sword the same color as their dragon - Blaaaarge!
- Flaming Blue Sword - Corny Poopie (And that's the Rating!)
- Ayra - WTF. Why does she exsist?
- The elves themselves.... Legolas would cry
Five: The Ancient language. So this language is like cheating, It makes it too easy to write the story. So how the language works is that whenever someone speaks in this language they have to tell the truth, and if you promise something in this language you can't go back on it. So basically the bad guys, never really have their own motives, the reason why they do bad things, is because the one bad guy Galbatorix, has forced them to swear loyalty to him in the ancient language. Basically if something difficult arrises in the plot Paolini just has to say..."well they swore in the ancient language." Grrrrrrrrrr! So Hitler was able to kill a shit ton of people with his Nazis, do you think they swore in some ancient language?
Six: The gore. Alright so I think a lot of Epic fantasy writers look up to Tolkien and his works because he really set the scene for how we view fantasy, including elves, dwarves and the like. He's also a pretty good writer and story teller. Thing about Tolkien is that he himself was a soldier in world war one and lived through world war two. And yet in his writing he never describes the battles in explicit detail. You watch the movies and the battle scenes are epic, you read the books and they almost seem diminished.
Paolini hasn't gone to war. I'm pretty sure he hasn't killed anyone. But he's fine with going into explicit detail on every battle scene or gory event in his books. One particular scene that stands out in my mind, is when bloodthirsty Roran is fighting in battle, and he's practically fighting all by himself with an injured shoulder and leg, and somehow he ends up standing on a hill twenty feet high composed of dead bodies, bodies of the soldiers he killed. All of them who probably swore to Galbatorix in the stupid ancient language. (that's convenient)
Eragon and Arya kill a group of soldiers with their bare hands, one of which pleaded for his life before Eragon killed him. Of course they go to battle a bunch more times and kill some more, and then they kill a little bit more. Towards the end of Brisingr, In the last battle of the book, Eragon is described as being "surrounded by a mist of blood".
I'd honestly like to take Paolini, stick a sword in his hand, ship him overseas to fight in the military and see how well he can hack someone to bits.
It's not that a little bit of gore is a bad thing, and he does mention the twinge of guilt his characters have for killing people, but I feel that he describes it to such a great detail, that it's just immature. I'm not sure how his books have gotten to be so popular, because he writes like a guy who plays too many video games, or maybe a pampered home-schooled rich kid....tell me if I'm close?
In the end I think my question is, will I read the last of the Inheritance Cycle? Hmm maybe. As long as I get to throw the book at his head.
(Anybody have some suggestions of other fantasies series I might actually like? I need to cleanse my brain of all this cheese, corn and gore.)
