The Fork, the Witch, and the Worm: Eragon

Pros: more incorporation of nature imagery and themes than I remembered.
This is the kind of thing that I think is fun, and that more authors should do: short stories / novellas set in their world that give the advantages of exploring a little bit more or answering reader questions without getting caught up in the weight of a full new plot.
There are a few moments of magic and beauty that I'm sure are what he was going for, in the vein of Name of the Wind.

Cons: While I loved these books in high school and there's a bit of a nostalgia factor, I'm a different reader now. I find his writing and especially his dialogue so very stilted that it definitely takes me out of the world and the plot. And the breadth of other things I've read make it harder to recommend this series, when I now have so many other works that are more interesting and have a shorter page count. But I'll always be grateful to CP for making my younger self dream about books and writing.