I am a relative latecomer to the goings on in Middle Earth having only read the Hobit and Lord of the Rings for the first time around a year an a half ago. I'd always wondered what all the fuss was about. Surely these weird Sci-fi type books couldn't be up to all that much, could they?

Well yes, they certainly could.

My impetus for reading them was the impending release of Fellowship of the Ring at the Cinema. I had tried to read LoTR a couple of times before but just couldn't get into it until it was recommended to me that I should read the Hobbit first. This I did and found it a very pleasant read. Reading the Hobbit got me hooked and by the time I'd finished I couldn't wait to get into LoTR.

I still found FoTR quite slow to begin with and it wasn't really until the band of Hobbits reached the Prancing Pony that I was hooked. I did almost give up with it when I encountered Tom Bombadil, with his "merry doll" and "rum-pa-tum-tillo" and it's safe to say I was glad to see the back of him.

Since these struggling beginnings I've recently re-read the books, and while I still dislike Mr Bombadil my enjoyment of them as a whole has not diminshed, on the contrary I would say I enjoyed them even more the second time round. However there were a few things I picked up on this time whih I had previously missed. By the end of the Two Towers and in Return of the King the word "verily" is used a little too much, every second word is verily! Frodo seems to have severe issues with things Gandalf tells him, he's told in no uncertain terms by Gandalf that he shouldn't wear the Ring, yet there's hardly a chapter where he doesn't put it on!!

Seriously though, the importance of Sam as a character really shone through to me in the second reading. Without giving anything away Sam has several key moments where if he had acted in a different manner the course of events
may well have taken a turn for the worst.
The strenghth, not merely physical but more importantly mental, of Hobbits (the most unlikely of heros) is also demonstrated on several occasions, the idea that the most unlikely of people (your ordinary Jo Bloggs on the street, the little man if you like) has the strength of charachter to meet and tackle everything thrown in his path, no matter how large is also very prominent.

I don't know a lot about Tolkein, but I gather that this was the kind of idea that he was kind of obsessed with.

In short I would recommend anyone who has yet to read LoTR to do so. If you watched the film and liked it you'll love the books. Once you get past Tom Bombadil it's a great read.

Go on, you know it makes sense.