The Lord of the Rings

The Fellowship of the Ring: The Ring Sets Out

By: J. R.R. Tolkien

Narrated by: Rob Inglis

Length: 19 hrs and 53 mins

Publisher's summary

The complete, unabridged audiobook of The Fellowship of the Ring.

Continuing the story begun in The Hobbit, this is the first part of Tolkien’s epic masterpiece, The Lord of the Rings, available as a complete and unabridged audiobook.

Sauron, the Dark Lord, has gathered to him all the Rings of Power - the means by which he intends to rule Middle-earth. All he lacks in his plans for dominion is the One Ring - the ring that rules them all - which has fallen into the hands of the hobbit, Bilbo Baggins.

In a sleepy village in the Shire, young Frodo Baggins finds himself faced with an immense task, as his elderly cousin Bilbo entrusts the Ring to his care. Frodo must leave his home and make a perilous journey across Middle-earth to the Cracks of Doom, there to destroy the Ring and foil the Dark Lord in his evil purpose.

©2025 Paul Delaney (P)2025 HarperCollins Publishers Limited

Critic reviews

"An extraordinary book. It deals with a stupendous theme. It leads us through a succession of strange and astonishing episodes, some of them magnificent." ( The Observer)
"Among the greatest works of imaginative fiction of the twentieth century." ( Sunday Telegraph)

Bombadil

My loset character that is sorrily missed and I am aware that he is not that importent, but he was so different then all the other characters. I love the book and the reader is pleasant to listen to he sings the songs and he is steady in his Quenia.

Thoroughly enjoyable.

A great story narrated by a very good narrator. Having listened to that, I could hardly be impressed more... For what it's worth, I can't say that the movie itself was ever able to do anything like that to me.

An epic adventure

a timeless classic with an amazing narration. doing my second listen and enjoying it like the first time

could not wait for my next sitting....

The story is gold as always, and the reading was done beautifully! if I had a grandfather reading to me, I'm sure it would be like this...

High quality audiobook!

Performance of the narrator is great, especially his singing. However, the book has a quite slow pace, therefore I would recommend listening at 1.2x speed. Otherwise, you will sometimes find yourself losing focus due to the slow narration. But that is only a minor thing. Enjoy ;)

great work

The book is a classic and Rob Inglis is great narrator. the audio has a little static though.

Fantastic

So good to get to this thrilling Adventure again after so many years. I recommend it for every Tolkien enthusiast.

Very nice but a bit too theatrical reading

Rob reads clearly and with feeling which is very nice, but I do wish he'd have read this less theatrically. It sounds too much like he's reading to little children. This is not a children's book, so this should be read with adult listeners in mind. Perhaps his thinking was that this is an epic fantasy adventure story set in medieval world and that's why he goes for the theatrics. I'm not saying his reading style doesn't work, just that I personally would have preferred a different approach. I am still enjoying this well, have listened to all three books within a week or so. Also, Rob's reading is less theatrical than Andy Serkis' reading sounds like judging by the samples. So, if you share my feelings and you don't need the voice of movie-Gollumn I'd advice you to buy these versions narrated by Rob. Rob's Gollumn voice is alright. Completely different but okay.

It's been over 20 years since I read the book myself but I'm fairly sure nothing has been cut out, as in these are truly unabridged. At least Rob sounds like he never got bored or tired of it, his reading quality is consistent at least most of the way through. (I'm currently well into Return of the King.)

Overall, would recommend. Just not perfect for my taste. :)

Well done but undone by greed

Rob Inglis does a very good job of narrating. Personally I could do without the singing and I would rather he simply read the songs but no complaints overall. You can hear every word very clearly and he reads with feeling so you don't feel as though he's just going through the motions.

My only complaints are:

1. In common with most Tolkien fans I think the book is too short.
2. The publisher and/or Audible are guilty of greed by dividing the book into 6 credits. This is not in the spirit of the contract that I have with Audible. Lord of the Rings is one book and should be one credit. It could arguably be divided into three books but certainly not six! Shame on you!

A lovely telling of this tale

I enjoyed the narrator very much. The story itself has very interesting characters and moves along so well you hardly notice your time going by. It's very easy to get lost in this world.