I almost can't believe you didn't read The Hobbit... just for completeness. It took me the better part of a decade (I started when I was 14, finished when I was about 25) to read LOTR the first time. I never got passed Tom Bombadill.
Once I did finally finish, I successfully tackled The Silmarillion for the first time.
I've attempted to read (or have read) Lost Tales 1, and started Unfinished Tales... but even at the peak of Tolkienmania, there was overload.
I thought I had The Tolkien Bestiary, but I went to my Tolkien section (I have acquired a bunch of the History of Middle Earth I expect I will never read) and I have what I guess is a companion paperback, A Guide to Tolkien by David Day, which seems to include snippets from a bunch of Tolkien books Day wrote.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
zvi
(no subject)
Date: 2020-12-19 10:30 pm (UTC)It took me the better part of a decade (I started when I was 14, finished when I was about 25) to read LOTR the first time. I never got passed Tom Bombadill.
Once I did finally finish, I successfully tackled The Silmarillion for the first time.
I've attempted to read (or have read) Lost Tales 1, and started Unfinished Tales... but even at the peak of Tolkienmania, there was overload.
I thought I had The Tolkien Bestiary, but I went to my Tolkien section (I have acquired a bunch of the History of Middle Earth I expect I will never read) and I have what I guess is a companion paperback, A Guide to Tolkien by David Day, which seems to include snippets from a bunch of Tolkien books Day wrote.
Apparently he's a Canadian.