Story

Much like Stormbreaker, I went out on a limb last week and nipped to the Cinema to watch the "Eragon" film that had been released. The general gist of the film is that a young boy stumbles across a blue stone which turns out to be a dragon's egg and it hatches for him. When a dragon hatches for a human, that human becomes the dragon's rider, which gives the rider magical powers and all of that. Apparently the land in which the young boy, Eragon, lives once had many riders, but the King, Galbatorix, did away with them all and now only he and Eragon are riders that have dragons.

The story is one of a boy growing up, learning skills, and developing his heart and mind. Usually, I would say that this is the normal sort of fantasy tat that you see nowadays, but the film actually touched me as I found myself absorbed into the fantasy world that is Alageasia.

In true style, I went out and got a copy of the book that the film is based upon, and although I haven't finished reading the book, there appears to be more deviations than in the DaVinci Code and Stormbreaker. Examples:

Film: Garrow is found dead at farm. Brom turns up and sets fire to Garrow's body after which Eragon and Brom set off on their travels.

Book: Garrow is found badly injured at the farm and Eragon uses the strength of Saphira to fly him close to Carvahall. He then pulls Garrow into the village where Eragon is taken in by the village healer, and Garrow is tended to by the wife of the Smith, Horst.

Book: Brom and Eragon journey to Terim to find Jeod. Eragon finds his magical powers two towns before getting to Terim.

Film: Jeod doesn't feature in the film, nor does Terim. Eragon finds his magical powers in the first village that he encounters with Brom.

Book: In Terim, Eragon visits a witch who has a werecat. The witch reads Eragon's future, and the werecat passes valuable information to Eragon through his thoughts.

Film: Eragon has his dragon knuckles read by Joss Stone, there is no werecat.

I'm only about a third into the book. I'll keep you posted about other differences as and when I find/remember them.

Have a good New Year!