The chapter titles are too long.

The Road to the Crossroads-
Again, effusive descriptions of the forests and trees and plants in the area of Ithilien. He really loves this area. I wish I knew where he was drawing his inspiration from.
The one thing I don't get is the title origin. The cross-roads that we see, I don't see what is particularly noteworthy about them.

The Stairs of Crith Ungol
where the effusive descriptions immediately and completely cut off, and barren, blasted wasteland pervades. The shock of the setting exposition abruptly ending makes me appreciate what he had done with the previous few chapters. Very well done indeed.
The stairs themselves are pretty cool, and i like the contrast between them and the sheer cliffs they had been traveling on. Its not explained how or why these cliffs came to be so far, and i'm liking the mystery.
When gollum returns to the hobbits, the way he approaches them and the description, well, i'm going to quote here,
"For a fleeting moment, could one of the sleepers have seen him, they would have thought that they beheld an old weary hobbit, shrunken by the years that had carried him far beyond his time, beyond frinds and kin, and the fields of streams of youth, an old, starved pitiable thing."
then a few lines later
"'I daresay,' said Sam. 'But where have you been to- sneaking off and sneaking back, you old villain?'
Gollum withdrew himself, and a green glint flickered under his heavy lids. ALmost spider-like he looked now, crouched back on bent limbs with his protruding eyes. The fleeting moment had passed, beyond recall."

I really like how we finally get a chance to see Smeagol, and it goes back to how the ring makes the bearer wane, "like too little butter over too much bread."
The quote continues,
"'Sneaking, sneaking!' He hissed. 'Hobbits always so polite, yes. O nice hobbits! Smeagol brings them up secrets ways that nobody else could find. Tired he is, thirsty he is, yes thirsty; and he guides them and he searches for paths, and they say sneak, sneak. Very nice friends, O yes my precious, very nice.'
Sam felt a bit remorseful, though not more trustful. 'Sorry.' he said. I'm sorry, but you startled me out of my sleep. And I shouldn't have been sleeping, and that made me a bit sharp. But Mr. Frodo he's that tired. I asked him to have a wink; and well, that's how it is. Sorry. But where have you been to?'
'Sneaking.' "

Comic fucking gold. I knew it was coming, I'd seen it in the movies, and it still lands so well. The first section leads into a fairly deep thought on Smeagol, while the second pins down who Gollum is in a single word. I am just in awe.

The Lair of Shelob

Creepy as hell.
I really liked how Golum's betrayal here is set up to be mysterious and confusing. Where did he go, we don't ever see him again the rest of the book, but Tolkien instead explains how he and Shelob had come to an arrangement. I actually think this is unnecessary, as in the next chapter we see two orcs discussing how Gollum and Shelob seem to have an arrangement or deal, and while we miss out on Gollum's glee at rooting through Frodo's things for the Ring, we get the concept.

The Choices of Master Samwise

So Sam puts on the ring, and moves on without Frodo.
Psych, nope, Frodo's alive. Paraphrasing 'Oh stupid Sam, you thought with your head, not with your heart, and you know your head's full of rocks.'
This chapter finally gives Sam the full spotlight, and we get to spend the most time with the ring than we have ever seen since Bilbo. While Frodo has worn it for scant few minutes, Sam seems to wear it for enough time to sneak past the orcs, watch them take Frodo through the tunnels, listen to them discuss several pages of dialogue, and then chase them into the tower.

@Nazgoose

 

Chapter 7: Journey to the Crossroads

• Having just gone on a long hike the walking sticks Faramir gave them feel like the best gift
• I'm kind of surprised at how few thoughts I've had that I feel like sharing since I picked this back up. Frodo and Sam just... feel less interesting/exciting to me I think. They mainly just walk.

Chapter 8: The Stairs of Cirith Ungol

• I like that it takes the phial of Galadriel to hide Frodo and the ring from the Witch King. Great way to show that shit's getting real and this was a real close call.
• Also, this line is very interesting:
  "But great as the pressure was, he felt no inclination now to yield to it. He knew that the Ring would only betray him, and that he had not, even if he put it on, the power to face the Morgul-king – not yet."
  On one hand it reads as him knowing that it's all a lie and putting it on can't possibly help, but it also reads as him now considering using it, which is the first step down the road to someday thinking he's mighty enough and keeping it.
• Gollum is using an awful lot of "if"s when talking about the road left
• Frodo's musings about him and Sam being in the worst part of the story that no one will want to read hits different when I was just thinking about the fact that I'm finding it a bit hard to keep going through their section, though I doubt he meant it as in people would find it boring.
• The "sneaking" scene is even better here than in the movies.

Chapter 9: Shelob's Lair

• So we made it into the lair without Frodo sending Sam away. I didn't remember that was a movie invention.
• Gollum's betrayal feels less explicitly expected than in the movies from a reader point of view, but more expected by Frodo given the previous chapter where we he says "we wouldn't have made it this far without him, if he's false he's false" (or something like it I didn't go back to check).

Chapter 10: The Choices of Master Samwise

• I like how variable the power of the phial is, and just how much it seems to take out of Sam when he finds a way to push it to all it has.
• Also that we're explicitly told "no fucking idea" about what happens to Shelob after this. Keeps the tale a bit more grounded into something that could've been written down after the fact by those involved, which this supposedly is.
• I really thought Sam would use the elvish cloak to hide, guess he's just really not used to resisting the ring? If so, that really does a good show of hiding how convincing it is
• The discussion between the orcs was fun.