Sauron Defeated

Volume Nine of the History of Middle-earth completes the manuscript history of The Lord of the Rings, covering the drafting of the final chapters -- the destruction of the Ring, the scouring of the Shire, and the Grey Havens.

Christopher Tolkien reveals alternative endings that Tolkien considered, including a version in which the Shire was not scoured and a different fate for Saruman.

The volume also contains a continuation of the abandoned Lost Road project under the title The Notion Club Papers, a remarkable two-part frame story set in an Oxford common room of the future, where scholars dream their way back to Numenor -- Tolkien's most sustained experiment with metafiction and one of his most unusual and personal late writings.