Christopher Paolini – Eldest (book 2)

In book 2 of the Inheritance saga, after the battle at Farthen Dûr, Eragon leaves with his dragon Saphira to start his training at the Elves’ homeland. He is running out of time. If he wants to defeat King Galbatorix, whose power has been constantly growing thanks to dark magic, he needs to speed up his training. The Varden have been betrayed and suffered great losses during the battle. If they want to stand a chance against Galbatorix they have to move to Surda - a quiet supporter of the resistance - and mobilize their armies. On top of that the empire tries to capture Eragon’s cousin Roran so they can force the Rider to serve Galbatorix. It’s a race against time. The King is gathering his army moving towards Surda. Eragon has to interrupt his training and help the Varden because if they perish no one will be able to stop Galbatorix.

There are three suspenseful narratives in the book. The main one follows Eragon and his training in the Elven homeland. The second one depicts the leader of the Varden and the power machinations around the resistance and outlines some basic political background. The third one is from the point of view of Roran, a farm lad, who fights the empire to get back his kidnapped fiancée. He has no power or status but his love for Katrina lends him a ferocious determination that has no boundaries.

The story develops and gets grimmer reflecting the characters’ ordeal. It’s full of suspense and unexpected betrayals. Each book in the series is planned to leave a nerve-wracking twist to the final chapter. If I had to wait for the next sequel to be published I would be driven to distraction. The books have at least 500 pages each and that’s a lot of thrill time to spend there. There was a plenty of important information that I have left out otherwise it would be too overwhelming. I have tried to sieve out all the important information because there is such an abundance of characters and it is impossible to describe them all.