Eragon is the first novel in the Inheritance Cycle by Christopher Paolini, who began writing at the age of 15. After writing the first draft for a year, Paolini spent a second year rewriting and fleshing out the story and characters. Paolini's parents saw the final manuscript and decided to self-publish Eragon. Paolini spent a year traveling around the United States promoting the novel. By chance, the book was discovered by Carl Hiaasen, who got it re-published by Alfred A. Knopf. The re-published version was released on August 26, 2003. The book tells the story of a farm boy named Eragon, who finds a mysterious stone in the mountains. A dragon he later names Saphira hatches from the stone, which was really an egg. When the evil King Galbatorix finds out about Eragon and his dragon, he sends his servants, the Ra'zac, after them in an effort to capture them. Eragon and Saphira are forced to flee from their hometown, with a wise man called Brom, and decide to search for the Varden, a group of rebels who want the downfall of Galbatorix.

For more than a generation now, there have been hundreds of imitations of JRR Tolkien's Lord of the Rings. These imitations rapidly settled into a genre known as "high fantasy", often written in semi-biblical style and always with rigid conventions of plot and character. To write "high fantasy" you need a map as frontispiece, dotted with invented place-names (half of which are interrupted by a needless apostrophe), showing a pre-industrial country governed by a tyrant (or Dark Lord). This evil ruler will be served by minions of a spectral and sorcerous nature, who in turn are served by a brutish soldiery (these usually more than a little reminiscent of the Uruk-hai). The oppressed inhabitants of this land comprise elves (who live either in or among trees), dwarves (who live in mined-out caves with their entrances hidden in a cliff at the end of a lake) and humans (who live mostly in walled cities or villages). In this land slavery is rife, magic commonplace, telepathy as normal as speech, and fortune-tellers always forecast the exact truth. Our hero will be found, young and naive, in a village at the edge of the map, where he will have been brought up by foster parents ignorant of his true parentage; but shortly disaster will fall, forcing him to flee. At this stage he acquires a sword with a name and also a mentor, a greybeard who instructs him in the rules of magic but is markedly secretive about all else. Convention then decrees a long journey, possibly a quest, for the companions. Halfway through, however, the greybeard will vanish or die, not to be replaced until the end of the volume by another, even more mysterious mentor (usually clad in white). Our hero forges on, seeking a way to destroy the Dark Lord, and eventually finds allies to join him in the Final Battle. This description fits hundreds of "high fantasies", and it is also an exact outline of Eragon . Christopher Paolini was only 15 when he wrote it, so it is not surprising that the story is very derivative. The surprising thing is how often Paolini has wrestled the ponderous clichés into a clear and forceful narrativeHe is particularly good with all things to do with the dragon Saphira, whom Eragon rears from an egg. The relationship is full of original strokes, from the moment when Eragon upends the fledgling to discover its sex, and the dragon objects. There is an episode when Saphira tries to land in a gale and keeps being forced into the air again - which, you feel, is exactly what would happen - and the originality continues in the gradual development of the dragon from a dependent to a sort of bossy elder sister and on into an irascible but loyal friend. Eragon and his dragon mature together, believably. But better still, Paolini has achieved a portrayal of true affection between boy and dragon, without ever labouring the point, and this shows real skill. Seeing all this, I can't help feeling that the adulation and publicity heaped on Paolini has done him a grave disservice. He must now be under huge pressure to go on doing the same thing - even unto the fourth and fifth volumes of his series - whereas he should be left alone to discover where his real gifts lie and develop them. Still, Eragon is published for children, most of whom will be meeting this kind of fantasy for the first time. As Paolini writes like someone gripped by his own story, he will grip his readers as well. There are tremendous moments, too, such as when the dragon rescues Eragon by pulling the roof off a barracks, or in descriptions of the dwarven fastness, which will chime so clearly with such moments in the Lord of the Rings films that this tired old genre is going to be given a new, youthful boost. What a pity, never mind.