If You Like The Hobbit You Will Also Like These Books

The Silmarillion - Published posthumously by his son Christopher is based on Tolkien's extensive notes and drafts. It is the sequel to The Hobbit and describes the world of Middle-Earth from its creations until the events that let to the journeys in The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. It is rather difficult to read and dense, but if you enjoy the way Tolkien uses language, you will enjoy this book plus it gives you a good grounding in Middle-Earth, which is important if you want to fully appreciate his other, related, works.

The Lord of the Rings Trilogy - I tried to read these three books before, but only succeeded after having seen the movies. I don't know if that is because I am not a native English speaker or simply because I needed the visual input to really be able to 'see' Tolkien's world. After I had seen the movies, I really did enjoy reading the books. The story starts some years after The Hobbit finished and without giving away too much, evolves around the journey Frodo, Bilbo's cousin, and his friends have to undertake in order to destroy the magical ring that Bilbo brought back from his first journey. Only if this ring is destroyed will Lord Sauron be defeated and Middle-Earth will be save from him.

Normally I care not too much about the background of an author, only about the finished book, but it did impress me that Christopher Paolini finished the draft of the first book (Eragon) at only 15 years! The story of Eragon, and the subsequent books Eldest, Brisingr and Inheritance is that of a farm boy that finds a dragon egg and his growing up, becoming a dragon rider, a fighter and ultimately the leader of the resistance against the evil King Galbatorix, he himself a dragon rider. The books are easy to read, but not 'simple' in their story lines and contain a great amount of character development, twists, sudden turns and surprises. Situated in a mythical world were dragons and elves exist as well as other magical creatures, they make for a great read for every fantasy fan that finds Tolkien to 'heavy'.

These seven books by C.S.Lewis, a contemporary of Tolkien and close friend and fellow 'inkling' describe a world, Narnia, that is parallel to others and can be reached by entering a magical wardrobe. Like The Hobbit, The Narnia Chronicles were meant to be a children's books, but have soon attracted also 'grown-ups' as readers. The language is easy to understand without being too simplistic and the books can be read either on their own, or as a series. But I don't believe anybody that has entered the magical world of Narnia, full of mystic, talking animals and epic battles would stop at only one book ;-)