This Months Featured Author - Christopher
Paolini
 Christopher
Paolini was born on November 17, 1983 in Southern California. He
has lived most of his life in Paradise Valley, Montana with his
parents and younger sister, Angela. The tall, jagged Beartooth Mountains
rise on one side of Paradise Valley. Snowcapped most of the year,
they inspired the fantastic scenery in Eragon.
Christopher was home schooled by his parents. As a child, he often
wrote short stories and poems, made frequent trips to the library,
and read widely. Some of his favorite books were Bruce Coville's
Jeremy Thatcher, Dragon Hatcher, Frank Herbert's Dune, and Raymond
E. Feist's Magician, as well as books by Anne McCaffrey, Jane Yolen,
Brian Jacques, E.R. Eddison, David Eddings, and Ursula K. Le Guin.
The idea of Eragon began as the daydreams of a teen. Christopher's
love for the magic of stories led him to craft a novel that he would
enjoy reading. The project began as a hobby, a personal challenge;
he never intended it to be published. All the characters in Eragon
are from Christopher's imagination except Angela the herbalist,
who is loosely based on his sister.
Christopher was fifteen when he wrote the first draft of Eragon.
He took a second year to revise the book and then gave it to his
parents to read. The family decided to self-publish the book and
spent a third year preparing the manuscript for publication: copyediting,
proofreading, designing a cover, typesetting the manuscript, and
creating marketing materials. During this time Christopher drew
the map for Eragon, as well as the dragon eye for the book cover
(that now appears inside the Knopf hardcover edition). The manuscript
was sent to press and the first books arrived in November 2001.
The Paolini family spent the next year promoting the book at libraries,
bookstores, and schools in 2002 and early 2003. In summer 2002,
author Carl Hiaasen, whose stepson read a copy of the self-published
book while on vacation in Montana, brought Eragon to the attention
of his publisher, Alfred A. Knopf Books For Young Readers, an imprint
of Random House Children's Books. Michelle Frey, executive editor
at Knopf, contacted Christopher and his family to ask if they might
be interested in having Knopf publish Eragon. The answer was yes,
and after another round of editing, Knopf published Eragon in August
2003.
Copyright © 2008 Random House. |
