I put reading this one off for a long time, because I was so disappointed with the 3rd book and frustrated that there was going to be a fourth when touted as a trilogy. That being said, I did enjoy the story and how the characters really came into their own in this conclusion. There were times that it was predictable and there were times where the story took me totally off guard. The predictability, I can live with. My only real complaint on this one was that the book seemed to not so much start but fall right back into the story after the last book. It was kind of strange getting back into it after such a long break. Overall, better than average and entertaining. ( )

It is done. This 4th installment of the Inheritance series delivers on action and adventure. The plot lines for the most part of nicely tied up. The only thing that keeps this book from going above 3 stars is the extensive overuse of words. Mr. Paolini took the phrase "show don't tell" and at points had me wishing he would share "just the facts." There are so many details, some of which looked like they would fit nicely in the plot (like the cray man searching the books for something... was it it the name of all names? Galbatrox' name?), yet nothing ever comes of it. Every word, every detail must have a purpose or it is just wasted ink. But that's just the opinion of a busy librarian who has over 2000 books on her to-read list. ( )

2021 ( )

ending = blah
( )

Finally I'm free of this shit. I only kept reading because was like "Oh it will be so interesting tho see how Paolini evolves as an author during the years it took him to write it", but the he fucking refused to evolve so I didn't have anything for that. Okay, fine, the writing IS better in this one, but the problem as I see t is that he doesn't allow himself to properly evolved. He is stuck trying to write in the same way as he has done since he started Eragon at 15, and ... well, it's not good enough. It never was. But at least he's stopped writing thoughts in italics for several paragraphs now, that was so embarrassing in the first book.

It has also become less preachy? Eragon mentions a little about his beliefs about how hard it is so take energy from an animal who is dying, but he doesn't go on and on about how superior veganism and atheism is (did Paolini start eating meat in this late 20s or something? Was he ever a vegetarian?).

Not much else has improved. It's still boring as SHIT. Fucking so much of this book is just FIGHTING and I ended up skipping over so much of it because I just didn't care. I barely read the final showdown with Galbatorix, the mysterious big bad of four books, because I couldn't be fucking bothered anymore. Ugh! Honestly, I was hoping Galbatorix would win, when he was first introduced I thought he was the most reasonable character so far. Okay, he did torture Nasauda and that was bad, but his politics seemed sound. Apart from letting urgals destroy cities what bad things did he ever do? After he killed the dragons and the riders, I mean, but if they were anything like Eragon and Saphira he was probably doing the world a favour.

Speaking of Nasauda, I thought I was gonna throw up when her first thought while confronted with possible death was to regret never giving birth!? What else do women care about amirite???? Childbirth is all. Obviously that was just to set up a stupid romantic sublot that didn't lead anywhere (as all the romantic subplots), but still. It was offensive honestly.

But as an ending to a series I didn't think it was that bad. I see some people are upset but it actually fit the tone of the rest of the book and it didn't cheat us out of the prophecy we got in book one. It wasn't enough to make the entire series good or for me to give it a higher grade that one star, but still, had I been into this books I might be content with it. Since I'm not, I'm just gonna say that it's the closest he could get to ripping off Return of the King without inventing elves sailing off Into The West.

And ripping off ... it wasn't until I read another review that I realized that he stole a line from The Hobbit, but wow, that did NOT translate to Swedish. I was so fucking confused by that exchange in the book because it seemed so very random and pointless, and that is in a book FULL of random and pointless dialouge. Not a good idea to put that in there just for fun. I liked it better when Angela almost said Raxacoricofallapatorius, though I don't like the constant implications that the Doctor has been to Agleasieshea. THat's just stupid.

Anyway ... I'm just happy to be free, just like Murtagh. If Paolini writes something else I'm gonna do my best not to pick it up because even though I hate him I'm still kinda rooting for him, hoping that he'll live up to his potential. But I don't think he's actually trying to do that, so I'm just gonna end up disappointed. ( )