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Jul 25, 2018isaachar rated this title 5 out of 5 stars
Many readers are lead to The Silmarillion after reading The Hobbit and the Lord of the Rings trilogy and wanting to know more about that world. While it suffices for that, I have also noticed a number of LOTR and Hobbit fans find the style of the Silmarillion to be too inconsistent with either of the two more popular books. For that reason, I wouldn't recommend The Silmarillion to anyone without offering the caveat that it is not a single story book. It is an epic, spanning tens of thousands of years and leading up to event's hundreds of years before The Hobbit. The book doesn't convey an adventure or series of adventures, it'as more a history of Middle Earth and most of it's creatures. For that reason, I actually enjoy it more than LOTR or Hobbit. After I initially read it, I went out and found copies of Unfinished Tales, the Lays of Beleriand and Morgoth's Ring (which I would recommend to those wanting to know more about Middle Earth but without the medieval epic prose) to delve further into the histories of the various peoples of Middle Earth. The Silmarillion is similar to books like 'The World of Ice and Fire' by George RR Martin, or 'The Hyborian Age' by Robert Howard, which convey the history of their respective fictional worlds and give context to the primary stories within them. If you enjoy that sort of background it will add to your reading of said main adventures, if you don't, you won't miss out anything by skipping them entirely.