Trivia / Inheritance Cycle

• Fandom Life Cycle: Stage 3, possibly stage 4 at its peak. The hatedom was always rather vocal, but the fans were also numerous and towards the end, the trolls and haters sort of drifted away. Possibly could have headed towards stage 5 if not for the abysmal failure of the Eragon film release. Currently at 6a - the set of short stories that was released around a decade after the final novel drew a fair bit of attention from fans, but didn't really spark much outside of that. The author Christopher Paolini has a new book that's starting a new series coming out in 2020.
• Follow the Leader: One of several young adult novel series which picked up speed after the success of Harry Potter. It was considered one of those books that helped tell publishers that yes, young adults do in fact have the attention span to read long books, especially ones that span multiple installments.
• Limited Special Collector's Ultimate Edition: Each book has received a "Deluxe Edition" reprinting which usually includes some goodies like drawings from cover artist John Jude Palancar and/or Christopher Paolini himself. Deluxe Editions are usually released a year after the original publication and can be distinguished by a ring of gold around the cover. Eragon and Eldest were reprinted together in an Omnibus edition which was so big it could be used as a bludgeon.
• Sequel Gap: The Fork, the Witch and the Worm was released on December 31st 2018, more than seven years after book four, Inheritance, was published (November 8th 2011). Murtagh, the series' first true sequel, will release in 2023, five years after the latter short story collection and twelve years after the release of Inheritance.
• Shrug of God: If anything even remotely related to a theory for an upcoming book is mentioned to Paolini's face or asked in an interview, he always responds with "No comment."
• What Could Have Been:
  • Christopher Paolini originally intended Eragon to have simply blessed Elva as a baby, but found out after the publication of Eragon that he had made some grammatical mistakes himself in creating the ancient language, resulting in Eragon's wording being "may you be a shield from misfortune". Rather than simply correct the error, he decided to make it a plot point in future books.
  • In early drafts of the final book (back before it was split into two books), Roran ended up becoming king of the Broddring Empire. Paolini changed this because he felt that Roran would be unhappy as king and that it was unfair to Nasuada.
  • Arya was going to leave Alagaesia with Eragon and Saphira, and Islanzadi survived; as such, Arya never becomes queen of the elves. This is a particularly notable example, as in Eragon's Guide to Alagaesia, which was published around two years before Inheritance in 2009, Islanzadi is said to have survived the Rider War, so Paolini clearly changed his mind about that between publications.
  • Originally, Murtagh and Thorn would've died in the final battle, but Paolini let them live as he ultimately felt it would unfair to them after how much they suffered (and most fans would agree).
  • The Inheritance Cycle was originally the Inheritance Trilogy (and is referred to as such in some early publications and by the film adaptation), until Paolini decided the plot was too large and complicated for one book and so split the final book into two novels, Brisingr and Inheritance. And he may have plans to write a fifth book as well. Before the split, the original draft of Brisingr was around 1500 pages long.
  • Paolini originally considered a few different characters to become the green dragon rider, including Elva, before deciding on Arya.
• Word of God:
  • Christopher Paolini answers a lot of questions about the Cycle, mostly in interviews. Just look at all the examples throughout the pages for this series.
  • Christopher Paolini officially stomped on the theory that the sapphire in Aren is the Eldunari of Brom's dragon.
• Working Title: In regards to a character's name rather than a story title. At Comic-Con 2010, Christopher Paolini revealed that in early drafts of the first book the main protagonist was named "Kevin" as a placeholder, before he came up with the name Eragon.
• Write Who You Know: The behaviors and mannerisms of Angela the herbalist were based largely on Christopher Paolini's sister, Angela.

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