 Hello everybody, E here. Welcome back to another book review. Today we're going to be talking about The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien. This book is very special to me. Before we get started, I want to show off the various different editions that I have collected over the years. There's only two besides this one. My friend Sarah Frost sent me this one. In fact, I'm going to link to Sarah's channel down below. She does Sims Let's Plays. They're very relaxing. She's Australian and her accent is amazing. So if you will, go down and check her out. Give her stuff a look and a like. I'd appreciate it. But she sent me, for a birthday gift, she sent me The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings trilogy all in this on the movie set kind of deal. And I mentioned at one point in time that I didn't want to read my collector's editions. I have this one from my childhood. This is a box set. I'm not sure when I got it. It's just kind of always been around. It was with my grandmother for, I don't know how long. It's the only reason why this one... If you've watched any of my stuff about the hurricanes I've been through and the stuff that I've lost, it's the only reason why this one lasted as long as it did. It was with my grandmother until she passed away in 2011. I'm going to show you this version. I try not to mess with these too much because they are rather old. I have no idea how old they are. Let me see if I can find... It just feels like they're going to crumble. I think this is a 1966 edition. I'm not sure. It's rather bland as far as the cover is concerned. The ISBN is 0395-282-659 if anybody wants to look that up. But it's blank on the back. It came in a box set. Nothing too special about it. I've got to get this back in here. Like I said, these things feel like they're going to fall apart. They feel like they're going to just crumble. I'm not doing this on camera because I don't want to accidentally mess something up because I'm in a hurry to entertain. I'm trying to talk to you guys and I don't want to mess up. The next one I have is this. It's from Hufflin Something. I can't remember. We'll get it open here in a second. Do you guys see the cover? Well, it's not really the cover. It's a slip case. This one isn't too special. It's not illustrated or anything, but it is a very nice edition. I like it very much. It's got the title and then the name in Elvish. I'm not sure how to pronounce it, but this was my reading copy up until Sarah sent me that one. I didn't want to read this anymore. I read it so many times. I really didn't want to go to the e-book route because I really don't care too much for e-books. This is Houghton H-O-U-G-H-T-O-N Mifflin Company, Boston. It says illustrated by the author. It is illustrated. I don't even recall that. Here's the map and whatnot. If you guys want to see when I do the special edition, the going through and showing the pictures and whatnot, if you want to see that for this edition, let me know down there in the doobly-doo. Let's get into the review. I've been talking long enough without actually talking about the book. In fact, this is driving me baddie, so give me a second. If it takes me too long, look, the box itself is just coming apart. I'm going to try and slide this bad boy in there because it makes me nervous. It's just sitting out. Anybody else get like that? I certainly get like that. Alright, put all this stuff over here and now we're going to talk about just the book in general. Every time I read this book, it's like the first time I've read it. I don't know why. Even watching the movies, this is the first and last time, you're going to hear me talk about the movies. Even watching the movies just make me want to go and read the book. I didn't care for the movies whatsoever. I did love the Lord of the Rings trilogy. The Jackson Lord of the Rings trilogy, but the Hobbit trilogy, it was just drawn out way too long. I would have much preferred a one really long film, maybe about three hours. I'm sure they could have managed it. Maybe two films, maybe, which I think was Guillermo del Toro's idea. I can't remember, but then Jackson stepped in and trilogy, yay. That's the last I'm talking about that. This is one of those books that every single time I read it, it feels like the first time, but it's also, I feel, one of the main reasons why I don't like fantasy. The Hobbit is a kid's book. It is for, I think, middle grade, maybe even younger. Well, I don't know, elementary school, something like that. You can definitely read it to a younger child and they'll understand every bit of it. It is told in such a fashion that it's like he's telling you the story directly and that's just something that I associate with childhood. I guess it's another reason why I like Stephen King so much because he talks directly to the reader throughout the books. Peter Straub does that also. A couple other authors do it. I think Garrison Keeler, is that his name? I think he did that. It's the breaking of the fourth wall. And I don't, I normally don't like that, especially in modern fiction. It feels not really like a cheat, it just takes me out of the story because I feel like I'm reading a story. But the Hobbit, it feels right because he's telling you an old-time story. He's, it feels like a storyteller sitting, an aged storyteller sitting down and telling you a story. The issue with this for me, and I'm not sliding this book, it's my own brain that I have a problem with here, is I look at fantasy and even science fiction as more of a, I don't want to say it's a childish genre. That's not what I'm saying. There's plenty of terrific adult fantasy and plenty of terrific adult science fiction, but it is kind of trained my brain to believe that that type of thing should stay in childhood. There's also something to be said about never wanting to grow up, the Peter Pan syndrome, that kind of deal. But, so I have an issue with that. Reading this book, excuse me, reading this book this time was a much better experience for me because I just read the fan toll booth. I'm trying to retrain myself to read like a child, to read and to find that innocence again and to try and recapture that love for adventure, I guess. I started a dust opening up, opening up that one box set. Excuse me. But with this book, there's so much nostalgia for me. It's the feeling that I get when I read it. It's not necessarily that I remember every single scene, every single line of text. In fact, I don't usually remember any of it because the language is so simplistic that just kind of disappears and you're left with just this beautiful story of this person going on an adventure that maybe he shouldn't like. He goes outside of his comfort zone, which is a terrific message. And that's one of the things that I love about the book the most is someone taking themselves outside of their comfort zone and just going off, not knowing if they're going to live or die or what's around the next corner. There are several scenes in this book. If you're worried about spoilers at all, I mean, the book's been out forever. If you're worried about any spoilers, now would be the time to probably click away. I'm not going to do the after the outro thing, but the trolls are a favorite scene of mine, the barrels, Merckwood. Everything that happens in Merckwood is just amazing to me. In fact, it is the best part of the book for me until the Battle of the Five Armies. And I'm always blown away by how quickly the Battle of the Five Armies goes once you get to it. I always blow through the last three to four chapters at the end of this book, in a hurry to get through. Smog, Smough, well, he trolled everybody with that pronunciation. The dragon has never been a highlight for me, which is odd. I've never been a dragon person, even though when I watched the original Game of Thrones, well, not original Game of Thrones, the Game of Thrones HBO television series, I got hyped when the dragons came on. But I've never been that dragon person, so Smog, I don't know how anybody says that name with a straight face. When the dragon shows up, it's cool. I like the scene. I like the visual of him laying on this treasure like a bedchamber, I guess is the way that, well, Tolkien describes it as a bedchamber, but it's just a pile of gold that the dragon is laying on. I do think that it's a little reminiscent of the earlier, and I don't know if it's a circular narrative kind of thing, but it is a little bit reminiscent of the earlier meeting with Gollum in the mines and the goblin tunnels or whatever it's called. And again, that's not a huge... The Gollum thing isn't a huge section for me, mainly because the first time I read it when I was a kid, I loved it because of the riddles. Nowadays, I know the riddles, so it isn't that great for me. I do, to this day, still find it funny. That he tricks him like he does by cheating. Bilbo literally cheats to win that contest, and this is a children's book. I think that message is a little muddy, to show that he had to cheat to get out of there, but he had to cheat to save his life. So maybe it's a little white lie kind of message where he's telling you, hey, look, if it's a dire situation, you do whatever you have to do to get out of that situation. But he screws, come on, let's be honest, he screws Gollum out of that ring. Gollum's down there, minding his own business, eating goblins and fish, and here comes this little thief stealing his ring, and that starts the entire journey. If you've been reading with me for Lord of the Rereads, I thank you for your companionship going through that first book. It's a lot of fun to reread it yet again. I am super stoked to get into the Fellowship of the Ring because I believe I think the only time I ever read the entire series, back to back to back, was just before the movie, the first of the trilogy came out, the Fellowship of the Ring, the Peter Jackson version. I remember loving the original cartoons, the Hobbit, what is it, the Two Towers, and then the Return of the King, I think of the original cartoons. I know there was only three of them out of the four books, there was only three of them, and they just kind of mashed them all together. Before that, if I did, I completely forgot about it. But have you read the Hobbit? Did you reread along with us, or read it along with us and just never comment it? Let me know down there in the doobly-doo. But until next time, I have been E, you have been U. This has been another Book Review. I'll talk to you guys later. Bye-bye!