The Silmarillion
- 4.7 out of 5
- 24,695 ratings
- 481 pages
Overall Content Rating: Parents Strongly Cautioned PG-13
This work is a dense, tragic history of the First Age of Middle-earth: creation, exile, broken oaths, and a multi-century war against a satanic figure and his servants. Expect frequent talk of war, death in battle, dragons, demons of fire, and sorrowful endings for many heroes and kingdoms. Dialogue is sparse and language is elevated; the supplied profanity samples are about oaths or reviewer speech, not modern swearing. Romantic threads include legendary love between an elf and a mortal, which reviewers describe as central and costly rather than explicit. Reviews also point to creation-and-fall themes parallel to biblical myth, deep sadness, and frightening supernatural enemies. There is no indication in these samples of explicit sexual content, strong modern profanity, or crude humor in the text itself; the main parental flags here are sustained violence and thematic darkness, with optional discussion of how reviewers read prejudice in the fantasy peoples.
Reviews first uploaded October 6, 2026 7:45 pm. Page updated October 6, 2026 7:45 pm.
These summaries are AI-generated from relevant Amazon reviews of this book.
Crude
2Specific words
- suck: 2
Profanity
7Specific words
- hell: 7
Sex
7Specific words
- rape: 4
- grope: 3
Violence Moderate
37The history is dominated by long wars, raids, and heroic combat. Characters and armies fight with blades and supernatural terror; killings in battle, treachery, and the fall of kingdoms are described repeatedly in a formal, mythic tone rather than lingering on graphic bodily detail on every page.
Amazon reviews mentioning violence
Specific words
- blood: 36
- stab: 1
Racism Mild
One customer review alleges metaphor-veiled prejudice in the world-building. The provided samples do not show racial slurs or explicit hate speech; concerned parents may still wish to discuss how different peoples and lineages are portrayed in an invented mythology.
About this book
The #1 New York Times Bestseller The Silmarillion is the core of J.R.R. Tolkien’s imaginative writing, a work whose origins stretch back to a time long before The Hobbit . This mythopoetic masterpiece is a must-read before you watch The Lord of the Rings on Amazon. “Majestic! ... Readers of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings will find in The Silmarillion a cosmology to call their own, medieval romances, fierce fairy tales, and fiercer wars that ring with heraldic fury... It overwhelms the reader.”— Time The story of the creation of the world and of the First Age of Middle-earth, this foundational epic fantasy is the ancient drama to which the characters in The Lord of the Rings look back and in whose events some of them, such as Elrond and Galadriel, took part. The three Silmarils were jewels created by Fëanor, most gifted of the Elves. Within them was imprisoned the Light of the Two Trees of Valinor before the Trees themselves were destroyed by Morgoth, the first Dark Lord. Thereafter, the unsullied Light of Valinor lived on only in the Silmarils, but they were seized by Morgoth and set in his crown, which was guarded in the impenetrable fortress of Angband in the north of Middle-earth. The Silmarillion is the history of the rebellion of Fëanor and his kindred against the gods, their exile from Valinor and return to Middle-earth, and their war, hopeless despite all their heroism, against the great Enemy. As a cornerstone of the fantasy genre, this work is the bedrock of Tolkien’s entire legendarium. “A creation of singular beauty ... magnificent in its best moments.”— The Washington Post “Heart-lifting ... a work of power, eloquence and noble vision... Superb!”— The Wall Street Journal Read more