The Atlas of Middle-Earth (1981)

If you are a Tolkien fan, then more than any other single book, this one should be by your side when reading The Silmarillion, The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings.

This book has maps, atlases, and crossectional views of every area and every significant building or structure mentioned in the 3 books set in Middle-Earth. Along with each map is a complete analysis of the events which occurred in those locations. It also contains information on populations, languages, types and locations of vegetation, and more. So much more.

This is the books which will help you in your attempt to keep everything connected. It will help you mentally picture the events. The book is extremely well researched using all of the resources made available by the Tolkien estate. There are dozens of books which many lovers of The Lord of the Rings can buy, including the many volumed History of Middle-Earth series and The Complete Tolkien Companion, but this book is far more essential than any of the others, and draws from all of them. The maps are produced by the author based on Tolkien's sketches as well as the information contained in all of his books and writings.

Be sure to only get the Revised Edition with a 1991 copyright. ( )

823.91

Maps of fantasy books are love. ( )

The book feels cartoonish, written for an audience with no more than highly superficial knowledge and a generally television-ish appetites. But I should have seen that coming; Tolkien's is not a particularly strongly cartographic world, although it certainly beats the chivalric romances (which didn't even have maps). ( )

An adequate set of maps, but not artistically up to the Iron Crown publications in this area. It has the advantage of being the real publisher's version of Middle Earth. ( )