Book Traveling Thursday is a weekly meme hosted by Catia and Danielle. Each week everyone picks a book related to that week’s theme, then you write a blog post explaining explain why you choose that book and spotlight all the different covers from different countries. To find out more check out about BTT go to the Goodreads group!
This week’s theme is: A BOOK THAT RELAXES ME! A topic which is inspired by today being “Take a Walk in the Park Day.”
Cool theme. Sort of a hard one for me though, since I tend to read exciting books filled with action, adventure, magic, monsters, and the like. Can’t really recall any of my books relaxing me. But there is one novel which is so familiar, so comfortable for me to read that it fits the criteria, I suppose. The book I’m speaking of is J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Fellowship of the Ring.
ORIGINAL COVER
You can’t get more original than the cover which J.R.R. Tolkien himself drew for the book, so I’m going with it. Amazing how this author was so talented in every area, including visual arts.
FAVORITE COVERS
I’ve listed these as my favorite covers for different reasons. The top left cover is the first Fellowship book I ever recall seeing as a kid in the library and being fascinated with. I did not read it at the time, but it stuck in my mind. The other covers at the top are merely ones I’ve seen and liked for some reason. As for the bottom two covers, the blue cover on the right is the book I bought and read as a young teenager in middle school, while the one to the right is probably my favorite image from the first movie.
LEAST FAVORITE COVERS
No real deep reason for putting these covers on my least favorite list. For whatever reason, I do not like them. They are not hideous or bad in any way, but they just do not excite me in the least.
So what do you think. Agree? Disagree?
bookwraiths.com 
Is the “blue” cover from your first batch the “silver anniversary” edition? I actually liked the silver ann.. covers more than the gold anniversary covers. I believe they used the same pictures, but different colors for the rest of the book cover.
I also remember buying that last cover on the bottom right [of your second batch of pix] when in highschool. I got the whole trilogy with that theme. Quickly got a hardcover omnibus in college from the SFBC. There is a red leather cover edition that I’ve seen that I want. But it is out of print and I suspect quite pricey now…
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Never really liked the movie-based covers. Made me worry that it was an adaptation instead of the original. (An adaptation of an adaptation?). Funny thing is my copy is the last one in the least favorite. I remember a lot of fantasy books having that ‘window’ cover at that time.
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I absolutely prefer the covers not affiliated with the movie — even the one I picked. As for the window cover, what I don’t really like is the images in the window. They just don’t capture the characters for me personally. Thankfully, there are enough covers for all of us to love different ones though. 🙂
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Some were okay, but most seemed to hit a specific scene or overall concept. Like trying to tease a bone with an ugly bone. Although, I will say I prefer them to covers that have nothing to do with the story.
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I have a different movie based cover and I don’t mind it; it focuses on the Ringwraiths. But I don’t like that Frodo based one.
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Yeah, the Frodo just doesn’t work.
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I remember those old covers from the books I borrowed from the library as a child. My favourite it the beautiful boxed book of the Lord of the Rings I have with a simple silver – and other metallic colours – embossed design on the door leading to Moria as designed by Tolkein: Speak Friend and Enter. Inside, the pages are made of onion-skin paper but there’s also a vast fold-out map of Middle Earth. It’s wonderful.
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I recall seeing a book like that. It definitely was very cool.
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Even though I did enjoy the movies (although with some reservations…), I don’t like the use of stills from the pictures as covers, either. And I’m a staunch John Howe fan… 😀
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I have no idea what I am doing. I still have not read any of these books, nor have I seen any of the movies.
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Read the books first, then watch the movies. 🙂
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They are definitely on my TBR this year. 😊
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I loved the LotR movies – not the Hobbit ones though. But, I never like movie tie in covers. I don’t know why, it just feels kind of lazy – I want the original artwork. A good choice of book – my books that I can relax with tend to be the ones I’ve reread – there aren’t so many of those these days as I always move onto the next new book. But, for example I was a sucker for reading a Christmas Carol every December and loving it. Something about it giving you a good vibe at that time of the year. Redemption, etc.
Lynn 😀
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I agree 😀 Our copy’s cover for this book is very similar to Tolkien’s original cover, which I think is simple but highly affective. Similar to you, I think I would pick The Hobbit as the book that relaxes me the most 🙂
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