TITLE:  Unfinished Tales of Númenor and Middle-Earth

AUTHOR:  J.R.R. Tolkien

EDITOR:  Christopher Tolkien

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DESCRIPTION:

 "Unfinished Tales is a collection of narratives ranging in time from the Elder Days of Middle-earth to the end of the War of the Ring, and provides those who have read The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings with a whole collection of background and new stories.

The book concentrates on the realm of Middle-earth and comprises such elements as The Quest of Erebor, Gandalf’s lively account of how it was that he came to send the Dwarves to the celebrated party at Bag-End; the emergence of the sea-god Ulmo before the eyes of Tuor on the coast of Beleriand; and an exact description of the military organization of the Riders of Rohan.

Unfinished Tales also contains the only story about the long ages of Númenor before its downfall, and all that is known about such matters as the Five Wizards, the Palantíri and the legend of Amroth. The tales were edited by Christopher Tolkien, who provides a short commentary on each story, helping the reader to fill in the gaps and put each story into the context of the rest of his father’s writings."

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REVIEW:

I found the sections involving the Third Age most interesting.  These include a fuller narrative of what happened to Isildur on the Gladden Fields (and the interesting things Aragorn finds in Saruman's tower), several extended narratives on the politics and friendship between Gondor and Rohan, a "missing chapter" of the Battle of the Fords of Isen where Theodred was slain, and a hilarious extra "chapter" on Gandalf's quest to convince Thorin to take a hobbit with him to claim his Kingdom Under the Mountain.  There is additional juicy information about Ringwraiths, Gollum, wizards (there were 5 of them!), Seeing-Stones and a peculiar race of humans called the Druedain.  

It really is a pity that Tolkien didn't manage to add some of these "unfinished tales" into his novels, even as appendices.  This book provides a selection of additional material for those who need to know more about Middle-Earth.  However, I do suggest reading The Silmarillion, The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, before reading Unfinished Tales to get the most out of this book.

The legendarium of J.R.R. Tolkien’s Middle-earth is vast and not everything was fully written out, however that doesn’t mean the incomplete material isn’t interesting.  Unfinished Tales of Numenor and Middle-earth is a complication various stories begun and partially revised by J.R.R. Tolkien then edited into a somewhat readable fashion, along with alternate versions, by his son Christopher that reveal backstories from all Ages of Tolkien’s world.

The first two-thirds of the book covers the First and Second Ages with focuses in the former on Tuor journey to Gondolin and more details to the Children of Hurin while the latter focused on various elements of Numenorian history and the history of Galadriel and Celeborn.  The last third of the book focuses on the Third Age with background stories and histories to various events and people that feature in The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings from the disaster at Gladden Field when Isildur dies and the One Ring is lost to the foundation of the friendship of Gondor and Rohan to the Battles of the Fords of Isen and Gandalf’s view of the Quest of Erebor and the Nazgul’s hunt for the One Ring.  And on top of those backstories are histories on various people and items featured in the four books, namely the order of the Wizards.

Unlike The Silmarillion in which Christopher Tolkien edited his father’s writing into narrative chronicle, he left his father’s work unfinished and supplemented them with alternative versions that his father hadn’t rejected.  This decision made the first two-thirds of the book a chore to get through or simple something to skim, however in the last third of the book the tales and histories were essentially complete with only some details not decided upon by the elder Tolkien before his death thus making for a better read.  Frankly it’s this final third which is the highlight of the book especially anything related to the elder Tolkien’s most famous works, in particular is “The Quest of Erebor” that connects The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings together than just the One Ring.

Like The Silmarillion, Unfinished Tales is for hardcore Tolkien enthusiasts that want every detail they can get from J.R.R. Tolkien.  Though the final third of the book has material that general readers might enjoy if they loved the author’s two well-known books, it might not be worth the money to buy this book new for it.

We're heading to Texas this weekend for some birthday celebrations with my wife's family. For a change I'm not running around at the last minute trying to identify a book to read, because I already have the perfect one ready to go: Gordon Wood's volume in the Oxford History of the United States series.

It all came together in a funny way, too. Yesterday I opened up my lecture on the Federalist era to revise it with some information I learned from James Roger Sharp's book on the election of 1800. To my surprise, I saw several changes to it that I had made when I first read Wood's book eight years ago. At the time I had to DNF the book for reasons lost to time, and I never completed the revisions to my materials.

At that moment I experienced an epiphany: now was the perfect time to re-read Wood's book to it's conclusion!

For me it's as though the planets are aligning in a once-in-a-lifetime conjunction. I'm just about to cover that portion of the period in my U.S. history class, so my interest in the era is at a peak, Add to that the generous amount of time I will have this weekend to read, and I should have no problem getting through a sizeable chunk of the book over the course of my trip. Plus, with early U.S. history looking like a regular part of my teaching schedule from now on, I want to develop my notes on the period, and there is no time to do so like the present. Best of all, having already read a good portion of the book, I know it's going to be a great read and an excellent way of passing the time while we're soaring over the Sonoran Desert. Now I can't wait for our trip to start!

This is an early Nora, a Silhouette reprint from 1992 and boy, does it show. 

The hero, Brady, is a tad overbearing for this day and age, the plot is somewhat dated and the actual writing... OMG, the HEAD-HOPPING!!!  It's so bad... it's SO SO SO bad.  I don't remember any Nora being this full of mexican jumping bean POVs. 

It didn't help that I didn't like the heroine.  She just rubbed me the wrong way. I found her rather self-centred and whiny which, I suppose, is what I'm supposed to feel because she's a high-strung concert pianist, but man... I really didn't like her. 

Anyway, this Nora was a disappointment to me.  I usually enjoy Nora's earlier work but this one... nope.  I guess it's the exception that proves the rule?