Ross Raymond Nunamaker

The Big Read Ten took place on Monday, August 10 and covered The Lord of the Rings, Book 3, part 2, chapters six through eleven and Peter Belmont, a content creator, presented “The Betrayal of the White Wizard & The Secrets of Isengard”.

The presentation was recorded and Peter was available for Q & A, which was nice. The break-outs began at 10 p.m., so I skipped those this week, but the questions were good and the time, as always, well worth it despite a late night on a Monday being East Coast based. There were about thirty people logged in throughout.

Peter gave good background on Saruman and Isenguard including Orthanc and the Palantir that went beyond the book and included content from the Unfinished Tales. The loss of Theoden’s son, the growth of Saruman’s power, possessing his own ring, and his slow corruption were discussed.

There were questions related to Grima and it was noted how he betrayed Saruman three times.

I was very glad to hear Peter state that he is of the ‘everything’ is canon camp and each person can decide what they chose to include.