[andrew.v.spencer]

Finished this a week ago.

Obviously spoliers*

A tremedous saga, the tragedy and brief success of Turin is, it seems to me, a succinct insight into the wider fall and decline of the free races of Beleriand. They cower behind their walls, hide in their forests or underground, and each attempt to resist, (many initiated by Turin), results in even greater tradegy. For me the ultimate failure of Turin mirrors the longer term fate of Beleriand.

The writing itself is archaic in style mirroring parts of the Silmarillion and old Norse sagas. It's also quite episodic, but hypnotic in its rhythm. It's quite gloomy in tone, Tolkien creates a bleak world, a world much darker than that of LOTR. If Aragorn, Gandalf and Frodo had lost the Fourth Age of Middle Earth might have felt something like this.