I first read The Two Towers when I was 15, completely by accident. I had gone to the library looking for something to read and picked it up without realizing it was the second book in The Lord of the Rings. It was the early ‘90s, and I hadn’t heard about the series before, so I just started reading. It didn’t take long to realize I had missed the first part of the story, but it didn’t matter, this book pulled me in so completely that I quickly picked up on what was happening and got lost in the adventure.
This was my first fantasy novel, and it changed everything for me. The epic journey of Aragorn, Legolas, and Gimli, the desperate battle of Helm’s Deep, Frodo and Sam’s struggle through the ever-darkening lands of Mordor, it was all so vivid, so powerful. Even without the first book as context, I could feel the weight of the quest, the depth of Tolkien’s world-building, and the sheer magic of the story.
This book is the reason I fell in love with fantasy. It shaped my reading tastes, my interests, and eventually even led me to create Risingshadow a few years later. Looking back, The Two Towers wasn’t just an amazing book, it was the gateway to a whole new world for me. And for that, it will always be special.
