“A star shines upon the hour of our meeting,” is certainly fitting. I was surprised that I was able to find it online quickly (my books are hidden away in boxes, so I couldn’t look it up from there).

I was lucky enough to inherit a boxed set of Tolkien’s The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings from my parents (both has read it while they were in university) that were well-read and that added a sense of oldness to them in my 11-year old mind when I first read them.

I’ve always been facinated by Tolkien’s mastery of language. He was a master of languages in our own world in addition to the ones he invented and I think that really shows. I was actually so interested in his books that I read a couple biographies about him. My own abilities to learn languages other than English isn’t so impressive, so I’ve never been able to absorb much of the Elvish he created, though I did enjoy it very much.

My personal favourite book by Tolkien is definitely The Silmarillion. It gives a lot of mythological and history to Middle Earth and includes his best writing, I believe. I find the stories to have more depth and they seem to have been written with even greater care.

I’ve honestly never read any Stephen King. My only exposure to him has been through film and the occasional invterview I’ve seen him do.