Young Writers Society

*Blinks*


Paolini is getting harder and harder to at least try to defend him.

But as I said, the Inheritance Trilogy may not be the best (so it is a bit unfair to compare it to HP), but again, it is not the worst. It does not deserve only to be thrown into the garbage or through the window. It is not a waste of paper.

The Inheritance managed to sell itself. Why? How come, if its so horrible?

(A rhetoric question, but I’ll answer it :S) People bought it, and people liked it. Up there, in this thread, there are a lot of people who admit to the crime. Albeit at first, but they liked it. They read the first book, read the second, and will probably read the third.

Then they compared it, blah blah.

But compare most books to what we generally compare Tolkien and Rowling - they don’t stand a chance either, do they?

Back to the cliché factor. Well, it is. But I’ll repeat myself: what isn’t? Ancient languages, the OLD Tongue etc. etc. - isn’t that widely spread? Elves and Orks - they are also very popular in fantasy, so as a manner of other magical beings. Admittedly, Paolini crammed a vit too much of that into one (or three) books, but that’s what made it interesting. That’s what grabbed our attention.

And it being a rip off of LotR - its not. Not entirely. Not any more than any other book. …At least there’s no quest for something that will save the world, right?

About the emotions: Not more, I repeat, than any other book. I think I did care for at least some of the characters, because I usually whine if I don’t. (Hehe, I read the books about a year ago, I think)


I have never seen so much people agreeing on the subject of a book. Really.

PS. Will YOU read the third book?

PSS. Us making wagers on how everything will turn out is a point for the author, right?

"People bought it, and people liked it." - it isn't that simple. A book is, unfortunately, sold by how many you can see in the shop window just as often as it is sold because it is good. Good publishing goes a long way, I'm sure any author will agree. Undoubtedly the book's quality has some effect, but I think you oversimplified here too much.

Kudos to Eleina for being fair- I'll admit it's more then I'd do. :p

I'll read the third book, because I do believe in giving second chances. I mean, if I somehow manage to publish "Geezer" or a book of poems, I wouldn't want people to hate my writing until they'd seen at least three pieces (three being THE Orthodox number, of course XD ). Besides. Paolini may have learned something by now.
Or I may hate it, because I'll be reading the LotRs series this summer XD

As you can see, from this it seems that the editing was extensive. I would imagine that any more and it wouldn't have been written by Paolini anymore. What also annoys me is that he's acting like he's above editing, above the rest of us that have to go through the same thing.

This is something all authors go through - once they've finished with the book, their editor will tell them how to improve it. It's not unsual for authors to mention how hard this is. It's not really fair ripping into him for this.

Remember, after writing Eragon, he spent a year editting it, in the same manner as we do on this site. The editting he's complaining about here is the suggestions given by his publishers (the ones that made his book succesful).

And you should give him some credit for writing such a succesful book at such a young age. He may not be the best writer out there, but if he can sell enough copies to be a bestseller, he was certainly a better writer at 15 than I was.

I see your points, and I appreciate your opinion on the matter, but I'm afraid I don't agree. Before I go on, though, I just want to make it clear that I have not read Eldest, having not wanted to go through a similar experience as with Eragon, so all my comments are made based on Eragon only.

Firstly, I will answer your rhetorical question, as I feel that that is a key area of Eragon's success. The answer is simple. Marketing. He came from a publishing family - therefore, he had no problems getting the book published initially. From then on, he toured in high schools all over the US, advertising, marketing his book. At one of these tour stops, the step-son of an editor read the book, passed it to his step-father, who enjoyed the book, and passed it on to a publisher. All it took was this one person to enjoy the book for it to become published mainstream. And this all happened because of the book's marketing strategy. And again, the bigger publisher would have been able to market the book better, and thus propelling it into the best-seller lists. It all came down to marketing.

You're perfectly right, other authors have done the same with Tolkein's elves/dwarves, but the reason we're highlighing Eragon is because he is the one with the most success, which most of us feel is undeserved. And what is worse, is that Paolini passes these elves off as his own.

And again, about the emotions: I'm afraid that Eragon's ideas of people and their emotions/personalities is, as I've said before, unrealistic. I, personally, have never read a book that handles these subjects in such a cumbersome, unrealistic way.

Perhaps it is unfair to compare Paolini with the works of Tolkein and Rowling, which, though others may disagree with me, are excellent in equal, but completely different ways. But there's no point in comparing the book to a crap novel. Unfortunately for writers, we will only ever compare their books to the best, and that is the way they improve.

And no, I probably will not be reading the third book. Although I never say never. I suggest you take a look here http://www.anti-shurtugal.com. It is a concise site on all the factors of Inheritance which make them... less than favourable.

-Kaz

He came from a publishing family - therefore, he had no problems getting the book published initially.

I could get my own book in exactly the same way. So you could you.

He self-published. The 'publishing company' his family owned was tiny, and only published a handful of other books. Self-publishing would get you exactly the same results. Heck, do it with www.lulu.com, and you could do it for free too.

All it took was this one person to enjoy the book for it to become published mainstream.

That's how it is for everyone.

I seem to recall that Rowling only got published cos an employee of her publisher stumbled across her book in the rejected pile and loved it.



I've never read the books, although I agree that they seem to be highly derivative. But c'mon, give him some credit.

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I've often talked about writers better than me improving and growing. It has nothing to do with arrogance. And I agree with him, actually - I do think Rowling and improved, and that the Half-Blood Prince is one of the best Harry Potter books.

I honestly cannot take that anti-shurtugal site seriously.

Seriously - first they complain that he doesn't do anything origional, and then when he tried to be a bit more origional with his elves, they complain again.

They write up a list of inconsistancies and plot holes, when other series - including Harry Potter - have far more.

They complain that he shows and tells, and say he should just show. Which is kind of misguided, as just showing makes for a rather dense read, and you really show do both.

And that was after just a little glancing through it. I'm sure if I stayed longer and kept on reading, I'd have come across other such stuff.

They complain about him carrying his own views into the story via the elves, and claim he's preaching. I don't know if he is - haven't read the book - but I think the way in which they insult him here destroys any credibility they hold on this point.

I can understand you disliking Paolini's books. But why would you make an entire website dedicated to insulting him?

I see your reasoning, Sureal, and I'm going to edit my above post.
On an unrelated to Inheritance note, Azkaban is the best XD
Back on subject...yeah, a hate-site is a stupid thing, basically. But since I've been reading the posts on here, I decided I'd like to see it from another view, and it's proving interesting.
I did agree, however, with the first article this
"Epistler" wrote. About how the book was mocking those other writers. I would suggest reading it, even if you think the site is immature.

I've got to admit, I haven't actually read any of the Inheritance books, mainly because of all the people fervently telling me they were poorly written.

Thing is- from what's being described, I've seen a lot of this same kind of thing on YWS, and...*shamefaced* my own stuff. Elves and dragons and independent women and upstanding heroes- who doesn't love them?

And the whole "I am your father" thing? Ah! Intrigue!

The question is: did this Paolini kid present them in an original way? Was there anything new and innovative in his writing? Most plots are recycled, or the basic gist of them, anyway. There are only so many themes in the world to write about, so it's mainly a question of, "Can I take someone else's idea and make it wickedly original-sounding?"

If not, please bash away.

I must admit that I've never read them either. Not really because I heard bad things about him, but because I kind of grew out of fantasy a bit. I love the genre, but his books were targeted at younger audiences.

Sam wrote:The question is: did this Paolini kid present them in an original way? Was there anything new and innovative in his writing? Most plots are recycled, or the basic gist of them, anyway. There are only so many themes in the world to write about, so it's mainly a question of, "Can I take someone else's idea and make it wickedly original-sounding?"

And the answer is "no, he did not." Hence the accusations of plagiarism from some. Had he done as you said, then perhaps he wouldn't be in this situation. It isn't even the fact that he's done the exact opposite of your theory, it's that he claims all the ideas to be his own. Inconsitencies and plot-holes, they don't bother me (although to be brutally honest, some of the inconsistencies that Paolini has written, though there are fewer of them than Rowling's, they are far bigger). It's the unabashed, bare-faced cheek for him to say that all the ideas are his. Anyone with a basic knowledge of LOTR or Star Wars can see they're not.

He's full of himself. At first I just thought he was kind of just a nerd, but he is really full of it. I really need to stop reading about him. At no time have I heard him at least encourage other young writers to use their talent to its fullest; all the talks about is Star Wars (aka the Inheritance Trilogy) and how "hard" it is to publish a novel. Yes, it is hard, but you don't have to whine about it. He also seems to act as if he's some prodigy who created this totally original book with a plot that no one had ever thought of before. Wow.

One thing that bugged me in an interview of him was when he was digging through his backpack to find the handwritten drafts for the third book and he was obviously pulling out the wrong ones to show how many books he has in there. He pulled out three journals before realizing the book he was looking for was the first one he had pulled out.

In addition to that, I can't stand his rather smug smile.

I think he's Ok, he's new and he writes pretty well *coughs*and the story's pretty gripping and all. i don't have any problem with him; in fact, i like Eragon and Eldest really very much.

*runs away in fear of angry mob*

*gets on Saphira n' flys away to safety*

I have to admit that when i first read Eragon, i thought it was ok...good enough to read but nothing special. Eldest...*YAWN* I just wanted to skip it hehe.

But, when i watched the film, it made me like the book more because the film cut out all the decent bits and made it as vague as possible. Yeah, ok maybe the CGIs were ok, but they didn't make the film.

As for Paolini, i think he's average...a good author for his age, but a bad one to be published.

Jesseble