A review by kmartinix
The Battle for Middle-earth: Tolkien's Divine Design in The Lord of the Rings by Fleming Rutledge

4.0

Really great commentary on the Lord of the Rings books Theres a lot of great info and connections of themes of the books to biblical references. I had never seen Gandalf as Moses figure and this really brought that to light. Same with things like, the idea that Sauron has no creativity so he could not consider alternative methods ie Frodo taking the ring to Mt Doom.

Rutledge really hated the movies, and while she kept those comments to the footnotes it kind of colored my opinion of the book. Her complaints are valid, but she also seemed to miss the fact that the movies are a different medium entirely and are an attempt to convey differences than the books. The movies are in no way perfect, but it seems unnecessary to point out plot changes made to streamline and condense the very think source material.