Biographical sketch on Christopher Paolini.

This was one of my work projects, and I just thought you might enjoy it.

Christopher Paolini as a child might be someone you would expect to write a series of fantasy books. He was born and raised in Livingston, Montana. He was home schooled his early life, and was comfortable with 1st grade work at age 3. He actually didn’t want to read at 3 or 4 years old. But his mother took hi to the library, and the books that first caught his eye were those of the fantasy genre. He read whatever seemed interesting to him, including classics, myths, thrillers, science fiction, and especially the fantasy genre, and writers who talked about heroes and elves, swordfighters and quests, and especially dragons.
Christopher Paolini is indeed a child wonder, whiting a book at age 15, which is close to the age of other teenage writers, who wrote their first book at age 14, 15, or 16. His head was teeming with ideas, and he was always daydreaming about dragons as a child. He graduated from high school in 1999 at the age of 15. That was when he started work on Eragon. He didn’t want to be published, but rather viewed writing a book long work as a personal challenge. He read books by Orson Scott Card and Robert McKee to find out how to write a plot line. With the plot line, he created his nine page summary, which he imbued with the famous fantasy parts of dwarves, dragons, magic, exotic locations, and a sense of awe and wonder. He drew some elements from JRR Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings and Anne McCaffrey’s Dragonriders of Pern series. These became the beginning of Eragon.
The story starts with a 15 year old boy named Eragon, who sees a gemstone with white veins while hunting deer in an area called the spine. It is actually a dragon's egg, and when the egg hatches and a magnificent blue dragon emerges, the boy's life is changed forever. The dragon is a female which he names Saphira. The evil tyrant Galbatorix has killed all but 3 dragons that are in eggs in the world. So it is Eragon’s destiny to save Alagesia from Galbatorix.
Christopher Paolini used much of the year 2000 reworking his first draft. He introduces 3 languages into the book. The elves speak a language based on Old Norse, while the Dwarves and Urgals use languages he made up entirely. He created a glossary at the back of the finished book, to show what the words that were used through the book meant. He also based the land of Alagesia on his home state of Montana. The Beor Mountains are exaggerated forms of the Beartooth Mountains in Montana. He decided to give his second draft to his parents, who helped him edit his draft. They removed much of what they called Bloat from the draft. His parents decided to publish the finished manuscript themselves, instead of doing it the traditional way of finding a good publisher for it.
In 2002 the Paolini’s published the book privately, and took 10,000 copies to show and sell to people. He said that this experience of promoting the book was very stressful. They didn’t manage enough money, and might have had to sell the house, but a famous fan came in and in came the cash. Author Carol Hiaasen was on vacation in Montana. His stepson bought a copy of Eragon, which even excited Hiaasen, who promptly sent it to his editor. Hiaasen’s editor bought it for a 6 figure sum, and rights to the next 2 books in the Trilogy. When Eragon was debuted in August 2003, it was third on the children’s best seller.
Critics gave it mixed reviews, and had mainly focused on the flaws. However, it has been floating in the number 1 and 2 spots on the children’s best seller list, competing with Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. The privately published copies have sold for more than a grand apiece, and the first widely printed edition is valued at $300. Christopher Paolini has one indulgence he has allowed himself. That is a replica Viking sword, which he carries around the house. He can’t really ask for more than people loving his books.

I hope you liked this. The website I got this information from was www.notablebiographies.com/news/Ow-Sh/Paolini-Christopher.html