Amph ~The Inheritance Cycle, by Christopher Paolini~ Discussing its literary merits

If the Hitchhiker's Trilogy can have 5 books (and one short story), why can't the Inheritance Trilogy have 4?

Kimball Kinnison

 

There's no reason why it can't have four books, but Paolini has decided to stop calling it a trilogy since there will now be four books instead of three. If the author says its not trilgoy, then its not a trilogy.

http://www.alagaesia.com/index.php

 

I remember Arthur C. Clarke saying once that all good sci-fi trilogies should have four books . . .

Wait, that's off-topic.

Well, my dislike for Paolini's work still hasn't abated. It's clear that he had not planned correctly for his series and that is why he's splitting up the story. Either that or his purple, run-on sentences became so long he has no choice to cut the book in half because the finished product will be over a thousand pages or so.

I am just frustrated that there's more people on the fanfic board here that are more worthy of being published than Paolini. That isn't right at all. The good authors deserve the contracts, the bad authors should be mucking up message boards. But it doesn't seem to be working that way.

 

But Douglas Adams is (was) cool/funny, Paolini is not. Not everyone can pull that sort of thing off.

Besides, the original covers are messed up now.

 

Adams was unique and a very funny man. His books were unusual and humorous. A trilogy in five parts is something that you would expect from him.

A "trilogy in four parts" or whatever is not expected from Paolini because a) his books are of a "serious tone" and b) as Nat says, he's not really all that cool/funny.

Yeah... we're getting off-topic...

Besides, the original covers are messed up now.

How are the original covers messed up? I can't remember what the original plan was. I just remember that people liked to call the third book (and what will now presumably be the last book) the "Great Green Brick."

I'm inclined to agree with rebel_cheese on how Paolini hasn't planned his series correctly. Although, I'm leaning towards the idea that his choice to cut the book in half was because of his writing style. In both Eragon and Eldest, I actually haven't seen much... well... story.

It's his writing style that's getting in the way. The joys of purple prose. Ho hum.

 

They say "Inheritance trilogy" and now he's changed the name.

 

If we writers were rounded up and sent to concentration camps by an anti-literature dystopia fifteen years from now, the Inheritance Trilogy/Quartet/Crapfest would be our forced reading material.

 

Among the others I think would be "Mein Kampf" and Jeter's Bounty Hunter Wars trilogy

I have a question, why does no one in Eragon die straight away? Is it different in Eldest, does someone die straight away?

I actually found that rather annoying as I know pleading-for-forgiveness death bed scenes are cliche and should be used as sparingly as possible. I've only ever used ONE in my stories as it can get way too sentimental.

 

Look on the bright side. We'll never run out of toilet paper.

 

I'm obviously not a huge fan, but please be careful with taking the bashing (concentration camp stuff) too far over the line.

 

Got the updated page count from amazon.com.

The new book's a tree killer. 896 pages long.

I'm not joking.

 

Paolini's books Martin/Erikson length. Wow.

 

IMO the best books are long. That's too much ERagon for me to slog through, though.

 

There's a big difference between a long book and a long borning book. LOTR (the whole book) goes over 1000 pages IIRC and there's never a dull moment. But I'll reserve my judgement until I have read it.

In his favour, though, I was not bored with the pace of the story in Eragon. I only thought the actual story was bad. He can write, there's no doubt, he just can't be original.

 

That is quite a big book. 896 pg, really?

 

Sorry, I couldn't help myself.

 

Hmm...

I guess it's "The Great Gold Brick" now. I'm usually a fan of long novels, but the narrative has to be well-written and it has to be able to hold my attention. Paolini's style doesn't do that. And I'm sure that 896 pages could be edited down; there's probably a lot of description in there that could be cut.

However, I'm going to try to hold off the negative comments as much as possible until I have a chance to look at the book. You never know... Paolini might surprise us one day.

 

Great Gold Brick?



I'll most likely be purchasing Brisingr, even though I never finished Eldest, if not for the greatest treasury of knowledge accumulated in one book on how NOT to write.

 

[image=http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/c/cb/BRISINGR.jpg]

Well, it's gold... mostly. And black. And considering its length, it feels like a brick. At least Eldest and Eragon both did (the hardcovers, that is).

I suppose you could go with "The Great Black-and-Gold Brick" or "The Great Marble Brick" if you really wanted to.

I'm just saying that because I recall people calling Book Three (before the title was announced and before Paolini said that the trilogy's now a cycle) "The Great Green Brick."

I won't be buying Brisingr. I'm going to university in the fall, and I think the money is better spent on textbooks than on a book I'm not going to read and re-read. I own Eragon and Eldest, so I might top off the entire collection some day "just because", but right now... no. I'll borrow it from the library. Or from my friend who's convinced Eragon is a great book to use for her English ISU (Independant Study Unit) because it's just so comparable to The Golden Compass.



Long story.

 

Why would you spend between $20-30 on it if you're not going to enjoy it??

 

That's what libraries are for, mate

 

Two things:

1.) I only read the books for educational value. They're great for teaching How Not To Write.

2.) I'll even enjoy Brisingr in a masochistic way.

 

I completely agree. I can name so many authors with such incredible talent on here - it just doesn't seem right.

- Serena

 

Yes, I saw.

But I still want to purchase it, regardless. If there's a book that's not rare and widely available, I'm going to buy it. If it's not, I may resign myself to the library but that usually means the book is readily available on google books or some other site. Once I need to check something, I prefer for that thing to be readily available.