Expanding on Voice's answer - what the 12 year old is recommending is Anne McCaffrey's "Dragonsong" trilogy: Dragonsong, Dragonsinger and Dragondrums. It's written for young adults and it's pretty good. (Anne McCaffrey wrote a long series about the Dragonriders of Pern; all the rest are adult books and other than the first one - Dragonflight - none of them are really all that good, but for some reason the Dragonsong books for YA are better - probably because she actually writes a good story when she doesn't include steamy romance bits for adults.) In terms of being "like Eragon" it's probably the closest you can get since a lot of people notice that "Eragon" is very imitative of this series in many ways.
There are other series that I would recommend and I think you would enjoy even more. Others have mentioned the His Dark Materials by Phillip Pullman, the Earthsea trilogy by Ursula K. McGuin, and Inkheart by Cornelia Funke. My favorite contemporary series is the "Abhorsen" trilogy by Garth Nix (Sabriel, Lirael and Abhorsen.) It's more like "his dark materials" than Eragon - more mature and complex, and a little "darker" in tone than Harry Potter.
If what you like about the Harry Potter series is the tone of the writing (smart and funny) I'd recommend getting into Lloyd Alexander whose writing is always witty and humourous and whose characters are really strong. He's best known for the Chronicles of Prydain series, which I love, but my favorite book by him is a non-series novel called "The first two lives of lukas-kasha." it's not as fantasy oriented as the others but it's a fantasy/thriller and very thought provoking.
You should also try "The blue sword" and "The Hero and the Crown" by Robin McKinley.
There are other series that I would recommend and I think you would enjoy even more. Others have mentioned the His Dark Materials by Phillip Pullman, the Earthsea trilogy by Ursula K. McGuin, and Inkheart by Cornelia Funke. My favorite contemporary series is the "Abhorsen" trilogy by Garth Nix (Sabriel, Lirael and Abhorsen.) It's more like "his dark materials" than Eragon - more mature and complex, and a little "darker" in tone than Harry Potter.
If what you like about the Harry Potter series is the tone of the writing (smart and funny) I'd recommend getting into Lloyd Alexander whose writing is always witty and humourous and whose characters are really strong. He's best known for the Chronicles of Prydain series, which I love, but my favorite book by him is a non-series novel called "The first two lives of lukas-kasha." it's not as fantasy oriented as the others but it's a fantasy/thriller and very thought provoking.
You should also try "The blue sword" and "The Hero and the Crown" by Robin McKinley.
