The Fellowship of the Ring; Book 2

By J. R. R. Tolkien

Catholic-ometer: 5 of 5

Enjoyability: 4.5 of 5

The second "book" of the Fellowship of the Ring chronicles how the ring arrives at Rivendell, a council is held to determine what to do with it, (and to provide some much-needed backstory,) and Frodo, Sam, Pippin and Merry set out again from Rivendell, alongside Aragorn the Dunedain, Legolas the elf, Gimli the Dwarf, Boromir the man and the wizard Gandalf.  The party travels through the underground realm of Moria, the woods of Lothlorien, and down the river Anduin towards the fork in their path, where they must decide where to take the ring; to Gondor; city of men, or to Mordor, where it can finally be destroyed.  As they move on, party members begin to fall away, until finally, the fellowship is splintered, with only Sam and Frodo left the guard the ring itself.  Most of the fellowship members are either dead or in mortal danger by the time this book ends.

The humor of the first half of the book is replaced here with high adventure, although some sections feel a bit tacked-on (such as the showboating of many of the characters during the attempt to cross Caradhras.)  Additionally, the stay of the fellowship in Lothlorien feels neither humorous nor thrilling.  I honestly found it more strange than anything else; strange in a good way, but not really all that engaging, compared to the passing through Moria.

It's odd to say that the strangest place in the second half of the book was also the least intense, but that's how Lorien came across to me.  I thought that the whole second half of the book was a great deal more interesting and exciting than the first half, if only because of the lethal enemies that get introduced right off the bat, but in terms of overall story quality, I'd rate them about the same.  The point of the narrative is never really to set a mood or dwell on how the characters feel, which is probably for the best on some level.  When there's evil to deal with, personal feelings really don't matter.

We're still not into the "war" parts of the lord of the rings, exactly, and Tolkien seemed to have enjoyed skimming over smaller battles in his books.  The more I read, the more I'm struck by just how much better the pacing was in the films.  The books are just as good and entertaining, of course, but they're entertaining in a more high-fantasy, intellectual sense, rather than stressing mood, excitement or drama.  Though the story is almost identical, the book and movie versions of the Lord of the Rings are really very different from one another in tone and pacing.  Me, I like both, but not on the same day.