Better than Lord of the Rings

I’m about to make a bold statement.

Last year, in my English 3 class, we had an elective called British Modern Fantasy, and in it we studied The Lord of the Rings saga (it’s not a trilogy). I loved it of course; it is pretty difficult not to love Tolkien. However, there is a certain similar set of books which I personally think are better than The Lord of the Rings.

The books I’m talking about are the Inheritance Cycle by Christopher Paolini. The first book is called Eragon  and I read it for the first time when I was about 12-years-old. The series grew to be extremely popular among young adults as the second (Eldest) and third (Brisingr) books were released. There was a three year wait between each book, which meant that by the time the final book (Inheritancewas released I was almost 18, and I have to say that I was in no way patient in each of those three year gaps.

I had such conviction during the Christmas holidays that I was going to sit down and read every book on my list that I had been wanting to read but had not gotten around to. This failed miserably. I spotted Eragon on my bookshelf one day towards the end of the holiday and I couldn’t restrain myself from plucking it off the shelf and starting to read it. Before I knew it, I was just as engrossed in the series as I had been back in high school. I sat and read them at every spare moment. I sped through them at a pace that alarmed even me, especially since the entire cycle consists of about 2 779 pages. I realised with only 4 days to go in my holiday that I still had the whole of Inheritance to read. I knew that I couldn’t take it back to Rhodes with me because 860 pages was a few too many to fit into my carryon bag. Let’s just say I may not have spent as much time with my family as I should have in those last few days. (I did manage to finish it, in case you were wondering).

inheritance cycle

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