The Hobbit
The Hobbit is a pretty awesome introduction to JJR Tolkien's
Middle-Earth. It's a fun children's book with danger and adventure and
cool new creatures. It's definitely lighter and less dense that The Lord of the Rings, but gets you interested in this world and what else is going on.
The chapters in the first half of the book follow a fairly basic formula. Bilbo and the dwarves meet some new creature on their journey to the Lonely Mountain. These creatures include fairly benign beings like the elves, eagles, and Beorn. There are also villains, like the trolls, orcs, spiders, and Gollum. Over the course of the book, Bilbo become more confident in his skills as he goes from hiding from the trolls to defeating the spiders and saving all his friends.
The back half of the book is more concerned with Smaug, whose defeat Bilbo contributes to but isn't responsible for. Then there's a battle over who gets to keep the treasure and finally Bilbo gets to go home.
Tolkien constantly hints that there's a lot more going on than this little story. Elrond and Gandalf are dealing with the Necromancer off-page, and both of them clearly have histories that don't impact Bilbo's journey. It whets your appetite for more stories about this world.
The main problem with this book, of course, is the complete lack of female characters. And I do mean complete lack. Even when the gang is partying in Rivendell or recovering in Laketown, they only seem to encounter men. It's a little disheartening that Tolkien didn't include a single woman, but that can be overlooked because the story is so good.
I recently came across a theory I really like that Fili and Kili are female dwarves. There's this running joke in fantasy in general that, male or female, dwarves all look the same. Aragorn even mentions it in the movie The Return of the King. So I've adopted that view as a way of putting some girls in the mix.
Re-reading this book got me super excited for Peter Jackson's forthcoming movie. I can't wait until it hits theaters next year. It's going to be epic.
The chapters in the first half of the book follow a fairly basic formula. Bilbo and the dwarves meet some new creature on their journey to the Lonely Mountain. These creatures include fairly benign beings like the elves, eagles, and Beorn. There are also villains, like the trolls, orcs, spiders, and Gollum. Over the course of the book, Bilbo become more confident in his skills as he goes from hiding from the trolls to defeating the spiders and saving all his friends.
The back half of the book is more concerned with Smaug, whose defeat Bilbo contributes to but isn't responsible for. Then there's a battle over who gets to keep the treasure and finally Bilbo gets to go home.
Tolkien constantly hints that there's a lot more going on than this little story. Elrond and Gandalf are dealing with the Necromancer off-page, and both of them clearly have histories that don't impact Bilbo's journey. It whets your appetite for more stories about this world.
The main problem with this book, of course, is the complete lack of female characters. And I do mean complete lack. Even when the gang is partying in Rivendell or recovering in Laketown, they only seem to encounter men. It's a little disheartening that Tolkien didn't include a single woman, but that can be overlooked because the story is so good.
I recently came across a theory I really like that Fili and Kili are female dwarves. There's this running joke in fantasy in general that, male or female, dwarves all look the same. Aragorn even mentions it in the movie The Return of the King. So I've adopted that view as a way of putting some girls in the mix.
Re-reading this book got me super excited for Peter Jackson's forthcoming movie. I can't wait until it hits theaters next year. It's going to be epic.
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