About to try Lord of the Rings again

Im not surprised, I started The Hobbit last year, guess where I'm at now. Not even halfway through! I suppose Tolkien's writing style is aimed at the younger audience ...particularly children who are easily amused by fire-breathing Dragons and silly dwarves going on adventures. 

Don't read The Hobbit first. Tolkien wrote an introduction that is printed before The Fellowship of the Ring. Read that. I wasn't much for fantasy either but gave it a try when a friend pressed "Fellowship" into my hands and said try this. It was easy enough reading and pleasant enough until the attack on Weathertop and the race to Rivendell (in one of my paperback editions that starts about page 250). That ends Book I. Book 2 is the great Council of Elrond, the decision to take action, the forming of the Fellowship and the beginning of the quest. About page 400 they arrive at the Mines of Moria. This was where I was hopelessly hooked.

Yeah, like the films, "Fellowship" is rather leisurely, but as the epic continues the writing gets tighter, the story more perilous. It is almost like you have words under pressure. The Riders of Rohan, Treebeard, the Battle of the Pelennor Fields, and so many other great unforgettable chapters that will stay with you for life.

I had said this before on this and the old boards that I have read the entire sage out loud - twice. Once to each of my two sons. That is in addition to the half-dozen or so times I have read in on my own.

The movie trilogy goes very, very wrong. "Fellowship" is OK and actually gave me hope, but I got uneasy as soon as the second film started and knew it had gone off the rails for good when we got to the dwarf tossing scene. It never recovered. I can't imagine that the "Return of the King" would make a lick of sense to anyone who hadn't read the books first. So many things go wrong. So many things are done so badly that any emotional impact is drained away. It was an action movie. Lots of computer animation. No characterization. No exhilaration. Just noise. The multiple false endings, the fade-outs fade back in, caused derisive laughter in the theater where I saw it.

Set aside some time each day. Turn off the phone. Get some alone time. Some "me" time. And read.

That's fine. I was just cautioning anyone about to tackle the epic that "The Hobbit" was NOT a necessary starting point. Dive right into LOTR.

My favorite fantasy book to this day (The trilogy is actually one whole book so I don't split them up) and primarily because of its writing.

I prefer The Fionavar Tapestry.

"The similarities between Tolkien’s and Kay’s trilogies are obvious and intentional. Like Tolkien, Kay creates a world that is different from our own, inhabited by races other than human (including dwarves, miscellaneous monsters, and his equivalent of elves-the lios alfar, “most hated by the Dark for their name was light” (ST 15)). Many of the characters are types Tolkien uses: the powerful dark lord, the noble wizard, the wizard who betrays, the warrior king. And the reader is introduced to this world by characters who are, in essence, outsiders, and yet who become the most important actors in the world; instead of hobbits, Kay uses five characters from our world-Kim, Jennifer, Paul, Dave and Kevin-who are brought by Loren, the wizard, into Fionavar. Despite these obvious similarities, Kay’s work is not a mindless imitation of Tolkien like the dozens that still appear in the fantasy sections of our bookstores. He uses the elements intentionally, and the ways in which he distinguishes himself from Tolkien shed light on the complexity of how issues like free will and sacrifice can be explored in literature."

Why should I be embarrassed about not finding a children's novel interesting? 

Haha you got me there but that's not why I havent finished The Hobbit yet, it's his writing style in Hobbit that made it seem so...different? Unlike Silmarillion and Lotr, The Hobbit was written as a children's novel and is devoid of darker elements, or lack thereof. 
I prefer Peter Jackson's version of hobbit though it derails from the source material.  Middle-earth is filled with all kinds of vile monsters and a formless evil forces who aren't so forgiving and it holds no place in the fairy tale section.  I grant you that if it weren't for Jackson's inclusion of dark themes like gory violence, heartbreak, and death, The Hobbit would be forgotten by now.