The Lord of the Rings

Well, it only took me about 8 months, but I finished it! I got through the first two books (The Fellowship of the Ring and The Two Tours) pretty quickly, but then I guess I got too busy and The Return of the King took me about 4 months, at least, to finish. But, I'm happy to say I did!

This is one book that I really wish I had read when I was younger, and especially before the movies were made. It was nearly impossible for me to separate the movies from the books, which both added to and took away from my reading experience. For example, the characters already had faces, even before Tolkien described them. I'll always think of Frodo with the face of Elijah Wood and Legolas with the face of Orlando Bloom. On the other hand, I could really appreciate the depth of the book when discovering everything the movie had to leave out. (Admittedly, I couldn't help but feel like Tolkien left out a very important sub-plot between Aragorn and Aowyn.) :-)

I have definitely joined everyone else in the world who is completely floored with Tolkien's ability to create an entirely different world, leaving out nothing, down to most (seemingly)insignificant details. I love how every group of people (if you can call them all people - elves, dwarves, hobbits, orcs, dunedain, wizards, humans, ents...) had their own detailed history which created who they were throughout the story and gave insight as to why they chose to live however the lived, why they said what they said and why they did what they did. That continued to surprise me throughout the whole trilogy; it all came across so naturally.

My favorite times in the book were always with the hobbits. I was always waiting for the next chapter that would go back to Sam and Frodo or to Merry and Pippin. The rest was, of course, wonderful too, but I really love the hobbits. Samwise Gamgee will always be #1 in my heart. :-) The moments at the end of the Two Towers, while Frodo is being attacked by Shilob and Sam fights and kills her and takes the ring to try and finish the task alone, and then saves Frodo after he finds out that he's still alive - those were my proudest moments.

I'm sure I'm the last sister to read this book, so I want to know who/what you're favorites were! I love you all!