The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien

One Ring to rule them all, One Ring to find them, One Ring to bring them all and in the darkness bind them

In ancient times the Rings of Power were crafted by the Elven-smiths, and Sauron, the Dark Lord, forged the One Ring, filling it with his own power so that he could rule all others. But the One Ring was taken from him, and though he sought it throughout Middle-earth, it remained lost to him. After many ages it fell by chance into the hands of the hobbit Bilbo Baggins.

From Sauron's fastness in the Dark Tower of Mordor, his power spread far and wide. Sauron gathered all the Great Rings to him, but always he searched for the One Ring that would complete his dominion.

When Bilbo reached his eleventy-first birthday he disappeared, bequeathing to his young cousin Frodo the Ruling Ring and a perilous quest: to journey across Middle-earth, deep into the shadow of the Dark Lord, and destroy the Ring by casting it into the Cracks of Doom.

The Lord of the Rings tells of the great quest undertaken by Frodo and the Fellowship of the Ring: Gandalf the Wizard; the hobbits Merry, Pippin, and Sam; Gimli the Dwarf; Legolas the Elf; Boromir of Gondor; and a tall, mysterious stranger called Strider.
(back cover)

I'm still reading in the introduction and this book is fascinating. My book is being returned due to due date, but I'd love to get my hands on this again. (02/07/2012)

Duh. It's a classic.

I hardly need to review this book; everyone knows it, except for those who probably wouldn't like it anyway. Although I like it, overall, it's not one of my top favourite books: I like some parts of it, but have to tolerate other parts that I don't really enjoy. In particular, although I don't strongly dislike Gollum—he's the product of his experiences, and perhaps pity is appropriate—I don't seem to enjoy reading about him.

Tolkien was, I suppose, inspired by the legends of old, and wanted to create his own legend in the same style. He managed to do this while at the same time writing something that would appeal to 20th century readers, which is a neat trick. I don't normally read the legends of old, they're not my kind of fiction; but I'm willing to read this. The introduction of the hobbits was surely the key to this achievement; we can relate to them relatively easily.

Glancing at a few other reviews of this book, I found someone who was bored by it. Well, fair enough; it doesn't bore me, but your reactions are as valid as mine.

I also found someone who complained about it being politically incorrect in some ways (sexism, racism, etcetera). I have less sympathy with this. Tolkien was born in 1892; if he had any notion of political correctness, it wouldn't be much like yours, and it's silly to expect it. Furthermore, he was trying to emulate the legends of old, when political correctness meant being polite to the king, and sexism and racism were merely normal human behaviour. Bearing all that in mind, I think the political incorrectness of this book is relatively mild.

There is also the fact that what we have here is a struggle between Good and Evil. I don't normally like that: I prefer characters who are more like normal people, neither wholly bad nor wholly good. But Good and Evil seem more acceptable in the context of old legends, and I can tolerate them here.

Sauron seems evil to the core, as far as we can tell; although he remains out of sight throughout, so we know only what his subordinates do, and what his enemies think of him. Perhaps he loves his cat? It's not clear what he gets out of life, nor what he wants to get out of life.

Gandalf and Galadriel seem prime examples of good; but both of them avoid the Ring because they fear being corrupted by it. Which suggests that they're not really good to the core; at least, they don't believe they are.

So I watched the movies ages ago and loved them, but despite having had the books for ages (years!) I'd never got round to reading them!

I finally have, although when I say ‘read' I mean I've listened to the audiobooks (saying that, having the books myself, I did follow along in the books). They were narrated by Rob Inglis and they were soooo good!

Listening to all three books from start to finish took me ten days. I'm not sure how long it would've taken if I'd read them by myself (a lot longer than that, is my guess!).

I think alot of the enjoyment of listening to it came from Rob adapting his voice to all the different characters! He did such a brilliant job of that. Well, that and bringing the story to life!

I'm sure I would have enjoyed reading on my own, but hearing the narration was a 100% better with the voiceovers!

Another reason for enjoying listening to the books was because it meant hearing the correct pronounciations of characters, places, etc.