The Heroes of Tolkien by David Day
This is a very pretty book with sketches, colour illustrations, time-lines and comparative tables. However, the content is dissappointing. This book comes across as a collection of superficial notes or dictionary entries of people and events, rather than a coherent analysis of Tolkien's heroes. This is basically a collection of occassionally interesting but speculative and flimsy comparisons between Tolkien's mythology, people, kingdoms, and events and those of real-world mythologies, legends, kingdoms/empires and historical events. The book provides nothing new for Tolkien fans and is rather repetitive, with numerous factual errors and confusion of names. Day also seems to refute some of Tolkien's own professed origins as provided by Christopher Tolkien in his numerous texts. There are no references so you can't research where Day came up with Tolkien's opinions or statements.
Recommended Book:
Aragorn - J. R. R. Tolkien's Undervalued Hero by Angela P. Nicholas
