2026 Reading List
January
The Treason of Isengard is the seventh book in The History of Middle-Earth series, put together by Christopher Tolkien and is a continuation of The Return of the Shadow. In Picking up The Return of the Shadow and The Treason of Isengard, I had expected more of an abandoned or unfinished story like Beren and Luthien or The Fall of Gondolin, but was instead met a look at what The Lord of the Rings could have been. It has been incredibly eye opening and insightful reading though the many different drafts and versions that the story went through before it even started to come together as the story that we know and love. It has also been quite inspiring in a way and has made me want to start writing a story of my very own. I had always thought the idea of writing a story to be fun, but I never thought myself capable of such a thing as I don't fancy myself a very capable writer. Reading the very first draft of the first chapter in what is now The Fellowship of the Ring, and realizing how bare bones it was and that Tolkien didn't even have any idea where it was going to go kind of showed me that I didn't need to be perfect right from the jump, and that it is a process and something to be shaped over time. The book has also given me tips on how to edit my own writing and how to work through that whole process by giving examples of what Tolkien did. This is a must read for anybody who like Lord of the Rings and/ or wants to become a better writer!
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