The Human Stain — Film

In my film and lit. class, we watched adaptation of the novel The Human Stain (Philip Roth). If you’d like a recap of the story, you can look at my review from last week. It stars Anthony Hopkins as the ‘current’ Coleman Silk, Wentworth Miller as ‘young’ Coleman, Nicole Kidman as Faunia Farley, Gary Sinise as Nathan Zuckerman, and Ed Harris as Les Farley. If you’d really like to know the rest of the characters, check out the IMDb page.

Although the movie was much shorter than expected, as Roth is a long-winded writer, it still wasn’t easy to watch. And even though I thought I did not need all the narratives in the book, seeing the movie without the majority of them felt rather empty. It made me appreciate the book a lot more. I don’t know that I would have understood all the important nuances of the film without having read the book (so if someone does that, I’d love to discuss it with them!).

I feel the film cut out a lot of the secrecy, which was my favorite part about the book… Faunia never said that she was illiterate, and she never got to explain why she was fascinated with crows. I don’t think Nicole Kidman did her character justice — which, I admit, is partially just the lines given to her, but she still could have been more Faunia-esque.

I enjoyed Lester Farley’s narrative in the book, but I’m glad they downplayed it in the movie. And then added in scenes where he talked with a counselor… Weird, but those were probably some of my favorite scenes in the movie.

There were parts to the film that played out well.  However, I have to stick with the idea that the book is always better, even in the case of a book I did not love. I was really surprised that the story attracted so many recognizable actors, it doesn’t seem like a huge hit at the theater. Anyway… I’m much more looking forward to reading the next book for class, The Constant Gardener.

Rereading old books, avoiding new ones

While attempting to finish The Human Stain (Philip Roth) for my film and literature class, I found my attention veering often. I desired to read a good sci-fi, fantasy, or dystopian novel. The Human Stain wasn’t giving me what I needed from a book. So… I reread both The Hunger Games and Catching Fire. Perhaps I should chide myself for reading old books when I keep buying new ones, but after I finished The Hunger Games the first time, I was sad because it meant I wouldn’t get to read it again for a while.

This rereading made me notice how much less I enjoyed reading Catching Fire than the first time through. The idea for the clockwork Games, and for the reaping to be from previous tributes was pretty ingenious (for the characters — I’m also still interested to know if they had the Quells picked out at the first Hunger Games, or if President Snow really picked this especially). However, this great idea felt poorly executed. I do still love Peeta’s character, though. He is so simple.

Whenever I reread a book, I think of something C.S. Lewis said… “It is a good rule after reading a new book, never to allow yourself another new one till you have read an old one in between.”

While I see this is a nice thought, I don’t think I would get very far, or be able to enjoy very many books if I reread one in between every new book. Especially because of my love for long series. Although do series of the same character count as one book/idea…?

I know many people who have already pondered the whole rereading books thing, but here I am, doing it again. What makes a book worth rereading? What makes you put down one book and decide to experience a story that you have already experienced, when there are so many new books and new stories out there? Also, why can’t my class read The Hunger Games and watch the movie when it comes out? (haha)

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Side note: Since this is already veering from my normal review, I also wanted to mention that my mom started her own blog (so proud!) about the sewing/quilting projects she does on a regular basis. If you feel so inclined, I suggest checking it out: karenskwiltingkorner.wordpress.com

The Human Stain by Philip Roth

I’ll tell you what I was told when I learned that I was reading this novel for my film and literature class. My professor told us that Philip Roth was the best American author out there, absolutely no questions asked. In my professor’s opinion, this is also Roth’s best work. I don’t find it comforting to start reading a book with such high expectations when it is a book that I would not have picked up to read if I didn’t have to. Also, it was what seemed to be a very long 361 pages.

The Human Stain is difficult to describe. I suppose you could say it is about a “retired” college dean/professor, Coleman Silk, who was disgraced as being a racist man and was enraged by this false claim, and so he hired the narrator, Nathan Zuckerman, to write his story. The narrator ends up writing a slightly different story about the older gentleman than originally planned.

You could also say that it is about a few other ‘main’ characters worth mentioning. There is, of course, Faunia Farley, the illiterate janitor working for the college Coleman was employed at. There is her crazed, Vietnam veteran husband, Lester Farley. Another professor at Athena, the college, named Delphine Roux has a small role, as she helped discredit Coleman. Then there is  the narrator himself. Every one of these characters are granted first person points of view throughout the book. I will admit that I don’t believe they added to the story that much. I did not enjoy most of them… though there were some bits and pieces that made each viewpoint worth reading. I liked the character development for Faunia, and the fact that she was fascinated with crows and convinced she was one in a past life. It was fitting that Delphine was a French aristocrat who came to America to make a name for herself, and seemingly failed, because I really detested her character. She was haughty and self absorbed, which was actually nice, because I could focus my dislike on a character that deserved it.

Near the end of the book, I found myself (grudgingly) liking Roth’s style of writing. However, after a certain point, I found myself bored and wanting to read other books, which is why this took me so long. Although I did end up somewhat enjoying the prose, I would say Roth is a little long-winded for my tastes. Some sentences seemed like paragraphs, and some paragraphs lasted pages. I can definitely see where the praise is coming from for this novel. I can also see how many have enjoyed it. However, it is not something I would have picked up on my own, nor something I would recommend to anyone who does not love strong literary fiction.

I’ve decided to post this review today, rather than next week along with the film, as this book has driven me to have a slight distaste for reading the past couple weeks — see my next post for a more detailed description as to why. However, on Monday, we will be watching the film adaptation, and I will probably review that in comparison with the book. Look forward to that sometime next week!

Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak

In my film and literature class, we are reading five works of literature: one storybook, one play, and three novels. We are then watching the film adaptations of said works and eventually are going to write our own short screenplays. I will be reviewing the books and films together. The first book we were assigned was Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak.

In class, we watched a 30-minute interview with the author, and I learned quite a few interesting things about his background and the origin for a few of his stories. I won’t go into what I assume you may think are boring details, but I will say that the interviewer helped make it clear that Sendak has an obsession with death. I found this very interesting… Although it does not pertain too much to this story, it was clear in some of his other works.

I haven’t read this book since I was young, and now that I did so in an academic setting, I looked at it through different eyes. We looked at the book through many lenses looking for themes. We looked at gender, social, personal, and the most interesting (or least boring?) political themes. The idea that Max’s mom had the power, Max rebelled, went to his own land, gained power, and relinquished it to go back to his mother.

In the movie, that was amplified. I felt it was more about the loss of power than the gaining of it, though. This was actually my second time watching the film, and I liked it more than I did the first time. It wasn’t too memorable when  I didn’t compare it to the book. On the second watching, it was much darker, sadder, and more interesting.

Still, it’s not a movie I plan to watch many more times. Although it is worth at least one or two watches, there’s just something missing that makes it hard to watch more than that. Perhaps it is the absence of almost any kind of resolution… Or perhaps Max really is too much of a wild child to enjoy watching him mess up everywhere he goes.

The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss

From the very start of this book, I loved almost everything about it. Although I was enjoying the Stephanie Plum (Janet Evanovich) novels, I breathed a sigh of relief once I let myself slip into this magnificent world created by Patrick Rothfuss. I missed reading my reliable fantasy stories. The Name of the Wind is a 662 page fantasy novel.

The Name of the Wind starts out in ‘present day,’ which I’m not sure of a relative time to ours, since this takes place in the Aturan Empire, a fictional land. As soon as I saw the map for the world, I wondered… why had I not bought/read this sooner? I absolutely adore books (especially series) with maps. I love maps anyway, but when you pair them with books, it’s magnificent.

It seems a little tragic to shrink the map this much, but I thought it would look a little funny to do one per line. And although I loved the map, I wish it had more… either major cities, or cities that Kvothe visited. It’s possible to imagine where they are, but I like to know roughly where to look, as well.

*—–Update—–*

I was perusing Patrick Rothfuss’s blog and found this lovely colored, bordered map. It also made me realize that “The Aturan Empire” wasn’t a general name for the land, but an actual section of it. Therefore, I wanted to add that Kvothe traveled most of “The Four Corners of Civilization” rather than just the Aturan Empire (he spends most of the novel in the Commonwealth).

Now THIS is a great map.

Anyway, back to the summary. Kvothe is a barkeep/innkeeper who goes by many names, including Reshi and Kote. He starts telling us the story of how he came to be infamous and that’s where it all begins. Most of the book consists of Kvothe telling his story, with brief interludes of ‘present day’ sections.

Back when he was young, Kvothe was a trouper along with his parents and other members of the famous Edema Ruh. They travelled throughout almost all of the Aturan empire, with the exclusion of some of the northern parts. I can’t really tell much more background than that without giving away a good chunk of the story. I can say he ends up in Tarbean, a large city, and ends up in the University to study many things. I only feel comfortable saying all that because it’s in the blurb, and so it’s not just me ruining plot points.

I’ll try to refrain from rambling about the rest of the plot. I have to tell myself to stop, because you will surely want to read it on your own. This book was FANTASTIC. Rothfuss creates a wonderful world with delightfully dark characters. His writing style is beautiful, and the way he tells this story is magnificent. If you are worried about reading a book that is 662 pages, don’t. Rothfuss’s prose is brilliantly simple, and flows so well that once you finish, you will wish the book was twice as long as it is. The character development is excellent, and I really felt like I was starting to understand the Kvothe of the past, if not the Kote/Reshi of the present. Kvothe’s friends at the University are also diverse and interesting to learn about. Rothfuss will make you learn to care about each and every one of them.

If I had to say one critical thing about The Name of the Wind, it is that young Kvothe’s obsession with a girl started to get a bit annoying. He is a teenage boy at that point, and the girl in question is indeed interesting, so I suppose it is understandable. Perhaps it was my own empathy for the character, because he was having little luck with the girl, and it was frustrating to the both of us.

Overall, this was a superb novel, and I highly recommend it. It is an excellent example of what Rothfuss himself calls ‘heroic fantasy.’ Though I am working on a few other novels for classes, I hope to soon buy and read The Wise Man’s Fear. It’s high on my list of books I can’t wait to read.

Hard Eight, To the Nines by Janet Evanovich

In this adventure, Stephanie is once again looking for someone outside of the regular FTAs. Her neighbor/family friend, Mabel, has asked her to find her daughter and granddaughter, who have skipped town on a child custody bond. Evanovich describes this as money put forth by divorced parents, who either chose or were court-ordered, to ensure that they would not kidnap their own child… or something like that.

Unfortunately, Eddie Abruzzi has his own interests in finding Evelyn and Annie (the missing persons) and is determined to scare off Stephanie to do so. She fights …. A new character appears in this book in the form of a very young, nervous lawyer named Albert Kloughn (and that is K-l-o-u-g-h-n, not c-l-o-w-n, which he manages to point out an annoying number of times). He tags along with Stephanie and Lula and generally gets in the way whenever he can. I was not too fond of him.

I absolutely loved the romance between Ranger and Steph in this book. She and Morelli had a bit of a falling out in the previous book, and Ranger sort of takes his place (in a non-boyfriend, much more mysterious way). Of course, Evanovich had to create a Terry Gilman equivalent (I forgot to mention her… she used to date Morelli and is involved with him through the police dept. these days), with Jeanne Ellen Burrows, who the blurb coins, “Rangerette.” She’s better than Stephanie at bounty hunting, and has been linked to Ranger… I’ll just say now that I think she was professional and interesting, but Steph just gets jealous of her past with Ranger.

I really enjoyed Hard Eight. Of course, I love Ranger as a character, but because of his romance and Eddie Abruzzi scaring the crap out of Stephanie the whole book, the laughter was scarce. It felt more apart of a series, where the rest of the books almost had a standalone feel.

In this adventure, Vinnie posted bail on an immigrant, Samuel Singh, granting him three months of legal stay in the United States. With just a couple weeks left on his ticket, Singh goes missing. Vinnie puts both Stephanie and Ranger on the case. Unfortunately, the first lead Stephanie gets winds up dead WHILE talking to her.

She starts receiving red roses, white carnations, disturbing notes, and pictures that put the notes to shame. Ranger and his posse take turns watching her back, and though she manages to keep the car explosion numbers down, she has no problem having Ranger’s ‘Merry Men’ get injured (a lot) while protecting her.

I enjoyed this book quite a bit. Steph, Lula (who is a better character now), and Connie end up going to Las Vegas to search for Singh. Also, Albert stops being annoying and starts being a lovable guy. Steph’s sister Valerie also is living with their parents with her two kids, so everything is hectic and wild and fun.

I laughed a lot in this book… At one point, Stephanie beats the crap out of some guy who was trying to kill her. After Ranger finds out, of course, all he does is grin and congratulate her. The scene made me laugh for probably a straight minute. Finally, she’s starting to hold her own!

Another part that made me laugh for a while was when Ranger and Stephanie went to pick up an FTA, and he decided to shoot at them. While still standing in the doorway, Ranger ‘instinctively’ pushes Stephanie off the stoop into a bush, and later said he was just concerned for her safety, while really he was just getting back at her for a joke she played on him.

Overall, this book was good, the writing was excellent, and the plot was decent. I really like that Evanovich started working more on her character dynamics. It makes the books feel more a part of a series rather than just mystery novels that happen to have the same names in them.

Hot Six, Seven Up by Janet Evanovich

In Hot Six, Stephanie’s bounty hunting mentor, Ranger, has been seen on camera walking out of a meeting with Homer Ramos, who is found minutes later with a bullet in his head and his body burnt to a crisp. Although the blurb makes it sound like it’s up to Stephanie to find him, she refuses to look because she knows he’s much better than she is at the bounty hunter business.

Joyce Barnhardt, Stephanie’s arch nemesis (haha), is the woman who was caught on the dining room table with Steph’s now-ex-husband, Dickie Orr, and she is the one who takes the FTA on Ranger. In the meantime, he charges Stephanie with keeping surveillance on the gun-running Ramos family to help find out who really killed Homer. Stephanie manages to kill four cars in this book, and it is pretty funny. She has many people following her, including  a guy who is constantly escaping her, and two hit men who are determined to follow her everywhere to get a lead on Ranger.

This book was a nice change in pace, as rather than having Ranger help Stephanie, she got to help him. There’s just something about most books with romance in them that makes the female character seem weak and passive, and this book definitely helped to fight that. Other than that, not much else stands out. It was almost as enjoyable as High Five.

In Seven Up, Stephanie has to bring in semi-retired bail jumper Eddie DeChooch. Although he’s old, I guess you could say he’s wily. She finds a course riddled with bullets in his garage, and every time she gets close to capturing him, he easily manages to get away. He ends up riding around town in a white Cadillac and stops to talk to Stephanie many times, including once at a funeral viewing, and yet neither she nor the cops can get a hold of him. Ranger makes a deal with Stephanie that if she finds DeChooch, she can call him to help bring her in… but then she has to spend one with him.

Stephanie’s sister, Valerie, also shows up with her two kids. Her husband ran off with the babysitter, and now the Plum house is much too full to feel comfortable. There are also a bunch of kidnappings and break-ins in this book. Two older gentlemen who are also looking for DeChooch break into Steph’s apartment many times, and are actually pretty funny, nice, guys.

Seven Up was decent. I liked the added romantic interest of Ranger, who is much more mysterious than the cop, Joe Morelli. It was a nice change-up from the rest of the books, where she was only frustrated by one man, rather than two. Although the romance was more fun in this book, I feel like the mystery suffered a bit. Maybe it was meant to be this way, but it only took about 100 pages to figure out the majority of the mystery. Usually, it takes me until they reveal the answer to the riddle of the mystery to figure out whodunnit, and in this book, that wasn’t the case. Again, I suppose it was a nice change, but reading the book after I figured it out felt rather pointless.

Four to Score, High Five by Janet Evanovich

I have decided to combine the rest of the Stephanie Plum reviews into two books per review, due to the fact that the characters generally stay the same and only the crime/FTAs change.

In this adventure, a waitress, Maxine, desires revenge against her no-good ex-boyfriend. She steals his car, he calls it in, and Vinnie posts for bail. When she skips her trial date and no one knows where she is, Stephanie has to talk to her creep of an ex-boyfriend and her coworkers. Unfortunately, people who know things about Maxine are ending up with missing fingers and other injuries. There seems to be a conspiracy going on, and it’s up to Stephanie to unravel it.

When they finally dig up a clue, it really is that… a clue. Maxine is leaving clues for her ex and Stephanie has to figure them out. Fortunately, she’s got Sally Sweet, a cross-dressing puzzle-master to help her out. In the beginning of this book, Stephanie is mad at Morelli because he skipped town for a few months and didn’t bother to call. However, being the hunk he is, she forgives him pretty easily.

I enjoyed Four to Score a lot more than Three to Get Deadly, so if you skipped that one… feel free to jump back in on this one. The romance is actually existent and therefore better than the last three books.

In this adventure, along with a bringing in FTAs, Stephanie is charged by her family to find her Uncle Fred. He disappeared during his daily errands, leaving his car intact with dry cleaning in the back. No one has seen him since the day he disappeared, and Stephanie has a hard time knowing where to start.

If Four to Score has you doubting, this one definitely brings it back up. After One for the Money, High Five comes in as close second to my favorite in the series. There’s just something about the supporting characters that really works for me. I loved Randy, who ends up camping out in Stephanie’s house for a while, and the RGC (trash company) mystery. And of course there is hunky Joe Morelli who makes Stephanie go crazy.

Three to Get Deadly by Janet Evanovich

I don’t really want to describe the book, so I’m just going to give you the blurb.

A “saintly” old candy-store owner is on the lam–and bounty hunter extraordinaire Stephanie Plum is on the case. As the body count rises, Stephanie finds herself dealing with dead drug dealers and slippery fugitives on the chase of her life. And with the help of eccentric friends and family, Steph must see to it that this case doesn’t end up being her last…

After reading the blurb, I wasn’t too excited about this book as I had no interest in an old candy-store owner. As I read the book, that didn’t change. I really didn’t care for most of the plot, which mostly entailed looking for the beloved Uncle Mo and avoiding Morelli like the plague. I only started enjoying it about 50 pages to the end. However, the writing was as enjoyable as ever, and I found myself writing down more quotes from this one than from the earlier two, so I thought I would share.

When a man’s got a nose looks like a penis he’s likely to do anything. It’s the sort of thing makes serial killers out of otherwise normal people.

That’s from Lula, Stephanie’s new partner-in-bounty hunting. She is an ex-ho who worked on Stark Street in One for the Money. She talks the talk, and although it was nice to see a new main character, I didn’t much like her. She isn’t too bright, but she’s plenty loud. These two other quotes are good descriptors of Stephanie’s personality.

I thought of Mary Lou’s kid with the graham crackers smeared in his hair, and felt better about being a bounty hunter. You see, it could always be worse, I thought. I could be a schoolteacher.

I might not be the most patient woman in the world, or the most glamorous, or the most athletic, but I’m right up there at the top of the line when it comes to resiliency.

Stephanie was as ‘good’ as ever, though her bounty hunting hasn’t improved much. Steph was afraid Morelli wanted to arrest her for her involvement in finding some dead bodies, so there wasn’t too much romance in this one. Morelli does stop over for dinner with her parents, and they assume he and Stephanie are dating.

Overall, if you’re not too committed to reading every book in the series, which is by no means necessary, I would say you could skip this one. It was good, but it definitely wasn’t great.

Two for the Dough by Janet Evanovich

This series is about Stephanie Plum. After losing her job, she decides to go to her cousin Vinnie’s bond company and try to make some quick cash catching fugitives, or FTAs (Failed to Appear). She gets her FTAs from Connie, the office manager for Vinnie, who has big hair, big boobs, and a big, Italian mouth.

In this novel, Stephanie is looking for Joe Morelli’s cousin, Kenny Mancuso. He recently shot his friend in the knee. Shortly after that, his friend winds up dead. Morelli ‘helps’ after being reinstated into vice, though he is running his own investigation and is hesitant to share information with Stephanie.

Things get crazy when a possible conspiracy starts unraveling, and it is a blast to go along for the ride. Stephanie also has to deal with a psycho  who is sending her body parts. Two for the Dough is probably one of the creepier of the Stephanie Plum novels.

My favorite part of this novel was getting to learn more about the Burg, where Stephanie grew up. This had to do with Stephanie’s Grandma Mazur enjoying going to funeral viewings to see how well the funeral parlor does the deceased’s makeup. The head of the parlor had a back injury, and his step-son Spiro has been running the place. Stephanie has to deal with him, and I’ll be the first to admit he gave me the creeps.

I liked Two for the Dough almost as much as One for the Money. If you liked the first book, you’ll probably enjoy this one, too. The writing is still nice and snappy. Now that Morelli is a bigger character, we’re getting closer to the romance, which may or may not be a good thing. Let’s read and find out.

One for the Money by Janet Evanovich

This series is about Stephanie Plum. After losing her job as a lingerie buyer for E. E. Martin, which by no means was her fault, she decides to go to her cousin Vinnie’s bond company and try to make some quick cash catching fugitives, or FTAs (Failed to Appear). She gets her FTAs from Connie, the office manager for Vinnie, who has big hair, big boobs, and a big, Italian mouth.

This book is about Stephanie’s first FTA, Joe Morelli, a cop who has been accused of murder. His bond was out for $100,000, which puts Stephanie at a cool $10,000 if she can bring him into the police station. Joe Morelli does not have a great reputation when it comes to women, which Stephanie knows firsthand, having lost her virginity to him when she was 16. They have an interesting past, and it keeps being brought out on their occasional meetings. These meetings are pretty funny, because Stephanie is new to this whole bounty hunter thing, and she does not have the best luck capturing Morelli. Luckily, her mentor in bounty hunting, Ranger, is there to help her along the way.

 I got the recommendation to read this book from my mom, and pretty much all the other women in my extended family. Since we don’t generally see eye-to-eye on reading material, I was weary before starting. I was pleasantly surprised at how well written it turned out to be. Although it gets my mom to laugh out loud on many occasions, I was still surprised that I found myself chuckling now and then, usually when Stephanie is at home, conversing with her hamster, Rex.

I really enjoyed this book. Evanovich has a way with phrasing, and I found myself mentally making notes of phrases that I really enjoyed — I physically wrote down some from the later books that I may share. Also, Stephanie Plum is a pretty strong female character who is fun to read about. Perhaps this just came at the perfect time in my life, or perhaps it really is as good as it’s cut out to be. Either way, One for the Money is a quick read and is definitely worth your time.

Also, every book in the rest of this series kind of spoils the ending of this one, so if you care to find out on your own what happens, read this one before you read the rest of my reviews. If you don’t mind spoiling a little bit of the fun, you can still get enjoyment out of this book knowing what happens in the end. I did, anyway. After reading a few of the other books in the series, this is still easily my favorite.

I hear it’s a new year…

I don’t make new year’s resolutions, because I know I will falter and I don’t want to feel bad about not caring about some lame thing I was supposed to work on. I DO however make a new list of the books I’ve recently bought and try my best to read a few of them before I buy even more.

Here are some of the things you can expect in the following months:

• Janet Evanovich books. I never thought I would like the books that the majority of the women in my family like. I don’t like romance and they don’t like fantasy. However, I read One for the Money and was hooked on Stephanie Plum. I literally read three of them today, and plan to start the fourth before I go to bed.
• Books from college courses… I’m taking a film/lit class and an Asian culture class, so there are going to be some new and interesting things I wouldn’t have picked up on my own, such as: The Lost Honor of Katharina Blum, or How Violence Develops and Where it Can Lead…  The Human Stain… In Praise of Shadows, and many more.
• I recently got a ton of Amazon gift money and of course loaded up on (10) new books, a few of which are: The Mistborn Trilogy… The Name of the Wind… A Song of Ice and Fire 1-4, and many more.
• I received You’re (Not) the One from the First Reads program on Goodreads, and I plan to read that, as well.

There are many more books I hope to get to, and of course, there are so many video games I got for myself and my brother for Christmas that I will be spending time on as well. If you are into that sort of thing… I got Left 4 Dead, Enchanted Arms, Dead Rising, and The Darkness. I got him Army of Two (we played 40th Day first…), a Splinter Cell game, and Prince of Persia. He also lent me Wolverine: Origins…. which I’ve already beat, Lost Odyssey, which I’m 11 hours into, and Assassin’s Creed which I plan to start soonish.

It’s going to be a busy year, and I hope I have plenty of time to read some good books.

Inheritance by Christopher Paolini

I expected to be let down by this book, simply for the reason that it was the last in the series and I didn’t trust Paolini to finish it in a way that I liked and that also served the characters well and did justice to the story. Boy was I in for a surprise…

The first 300 pages of Inheritance did nothing to quell my fears that Paolini wasn’t going to deliver. They consisted of battles and nearly nothing else. Although I enjoy the way he writes battles, I didn’t want to read about them for 300+ pages. Once he got past that, though, I was definitely drawn back into the story.

In Inheritance, we learn more about Roran, Eragon’s cousin, who finally got interesting (I could not stand his parts in Eldest). Galbatorix, the evil tyrannical ruler, also became more than just an evil bad guy, and he played a decent role. Although I never really gave a hoot about Nasuada, the leader of the Varden, even she became a much more fulfilling character. If I was in any doubt of Paolini’s storytelling abilities, this book delighted me into believing he is a gifted writer.

Although I predicted much of what happens in the end, I wouldn’t say it is a bad thing. Enough happens that I could not possibly predict, that was amazingly well done, that I was satisfied by this end of the series. I was also saddened that I knew I was leaving Eragon and Saphira’s lives for good, though Paolini heavily suggested he wasn’t going to abandon future stories in the land of Alagaësia, which pleases me greatly.

My recommendation of this book should be evident by now. If you read the rest of the series, you have to read this. It is a very satisfying end to the series. If you haven’t read Eragon and you enjoy fantasy, I highly suggest trying it out. The world Paolini creates is magically wonderful, and I know I’ll probably be rereading the whole series over summer if I have the time.