The Children of Hurin

I plan to read it. You could say that bits of The Silmarillion are covered in The Lord of the Rings, but The Sil makes it more interesting.

 

I'd like to read it as well, but I hope it is better than some of the History of Middle Eath stuff that is out there. They're good stories and all, but as Turumbar hinted at, they don't make a very cohesive story, more like a bunch of notes. We'll see.

 

Although I find all those UT-like notes quite tiresome while reading an interesting story I agree with Andúril, so I'll definitely read that new book. We'll see how good it is when we've all read it.
My curiosity just made me pre-order it, so I'll get it punctually on April 17. Yay me.

 

*Snap ~ likewise pre-ordered*

It will be interesting ~ as Turambar says these tales are already covered at least in part in Lost Tales / Silmarilion / Unfinished tales ~ the new book is 320 pages and has been, I quote; "painstakingly restored from Tolkien's manuscripts and presented for the first time as a fully continuous and standalone story". On the negative hand I also quote; "in this book Christopher Tolkien has constructed, after long study of the manuscripts, a coherent narrative without any editorial invention" which would imply it's not going to have changed much ~ which seems a bit contradictory

Oh well ~ it's Tolkien and that's all that matters

 

My wife picked it up for me on the 18th. I read it on the morning of the 20th. It was a quick but gripping read...here's my thoughts for any interested.

http://blog-burns.blogspot.com/2007/04/review-children-of-hrin.html

 

I've bought the book but haven't read the damn thing yet. I'm dying too because it actually looks good.

 

I finally read this... It was good and the story was fleshed out enough to make it worthwhile... but the writing is the same intentionally stilted archaic form that makes the Silmarillion so difficult for many people. I enjoyed it though Hurin and Turin was my least favorite section of the Silmarillion. If they do more of the stories like this I wouldnt hesitate to pick them up.

 

I still need to find the money for the book...but I think it needs a retelling for a few reasons. One is that, by reading some of Christopher's editorial notes, you can tell that the tale of Turin meant alot to his father, you can tell that by reading the Lay in alliterative verse. That was Tolkien's favorite style of writing poetry and yet this is one of the few he does it in, is that because he saved the best tale for his favorite format?

I, personally, look forward to reading it.

 

Wasn't the book "The Children of Hurin" just a collection of stories from Tolkien's other books??

 

Not really. The book was an unfinished manuscript from Tolkien. He was planning on a second trilogy. He said that he would have liked to do Beren and Luthien, The Children of Hurin, and The Fall of Gondolin. He did Beren and Luthien in the Silmarillion as an almost separate work. Children of Hurin was unfinished, and Fall of Gondolin was simply a story put in the Silmarillion. As a result this book was unfinished, some parts in Hurin are great, and some really needed more work.

 

Gotcha . . that makes sense, but still . . a lot of the "Hurin" book was reprinted from other J.R.R books . .

 

Well, the story was retold. These writings were not.

 

Just got my hands on this book. So far, I'm pretty happy with it. Well written imo.

I've not memorised the entire The Silmarillion and Unfinished Tales like some others on the forum, so I cannot say anything about it deviating, but from what I've read so far I've been pretty happy.

 

It's a frickin great story and if someone wants to repackage old material to get more people to read it (or some people to read it again) then good on um. although their motives may not be to my liking the outcome can't be all that bad.

 

i read it and i rather enjoyed it... i like Turin his a really badass but only one thing bothers me and i woulld like to hear how you guys think.... The end REALLY SUCKS HARD i hate how it ends.

 

I am half way throught the children of hurin but so far I have really enjoyed it. Thus, it will probably be the best book I have ever read written by the best author of all time!

 

Brilliant book.

The story about Turin is one of the best parts of 'Silmarillion'. And one of the saddest.

BTW Don't you think that the end of 'The Children of Hurin' was similar to 'Romeo and Juliet'?