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Healing the Long Cleeve by TopazTook	8 Review(s)
Larner	Reviewed Chapter: 23 on 8/12/2005
How the webs we weave catch ourselves in the end. Satisfactory that Ganelon is caught himself, and has lost all just when he thought he held all within his own hands. Author Reply: Hoist by our own petards, as it were... Glad you thought the Ganelon comeuppance was satisfactory. iIt really is all his own fault.

Lindelea	Reviewed Chapter: 23 on 5/16/2005
Oh my. Still reeling from the swirl of varied emotions brought forth by this chapter. Author Reply: OK. Hope you feel steadier after a good night's sleep. :)

Marion	Reviewed Chapter: 23 on 4/12/2005
I know, I know... I already reviewed this chapter. Twice. But I just wanted to say something about Pervinca. The red thread through this fic has been the fact that most characters saw others as they saw themselves (Merry couldn't understand why Pippin agreed with the arranged marriage because HE wouldn't do so - because he couldn't imaging not falling in love with one's bride like he did with Estella. Honeysuckle couldn't understand Diamond's enjoyment of sex with her husband because SHE never enjoyed any hanky-panky. Pip and Diamond had trouble communicating their thoughts because each assumed that the other had the same 'tape' in their heads, etc) Pervinca couldn't imagine Pippin being happy in his arranged mariage because HER arranged marriage. You might think this foolish, but in truth she hasn't been any more foolish than, say, Merry, Honeysuckle, Pippin or Diamond have been. It's also very easy to condemn her for conspiring with Ganelon, but I want to say something in her defense: I think it was purely criminal of Paladin and Eglantine to marry off their daughter like that. Yes, it was a 'war-situation'. Yes, they probably said something like "if you really, really don't want this we won't force you". That doesn't matter. Pervinca had the choice of marrying him or the possibility of Sharkey's men invading Tookland. Maybe she even had some romantic idea that her arranged husband might even be a nice person. Well, she found out during her wedding night, didn't she? (her first child was born nine months after the wedding; no gentle woeing and courting for Pervinca) Her husband has no more consideration for her than he would've for a breeding cow. She is utterly miserable. All he wants from her is children. All the choice she - apparantly - has in this is to lay on her back and think of England. Frankly, I can't think of a worse fate. She can't even complain of her life to anyone. Not only because Tookland has apparantly decided NOT to Talk About The Unsavory Affair, but because Paladin is in such health (imagine her guilt if she lashed out against her father and he had a heartattack or something - even after everything, she still loves her father) Well, this review has become more of an essay. All I wanted to say is, just because Pippin and Diamond's marriage turned out to be a happy one, doesn't mean that it is okay to marry of your children for political reasons to people they didn't know. Pippin and Diamond were LUCKY. Pervinca wasn't so lucky. And I can't blame her for wanting to 'free' her brother of his wife like she, no doubt, would want to be freed of her husband. Author Reply: Another theme to this story is also that every marriage is different --- including those that, from the outside, seem similar or began in similar circumstances. (There are many themes to this story. Probably more than I’m even aware of.) Pervinca was unlucky, too, in essentially being in the wrong place at the wrong time: she was, at the time of the War of the Rings, the only unmarried daughter of Thain Paladin. (And, if Pippin hadn’t come back from the Quest, she would have been his only unmarried child.) She probably did have some romantic hopes for her husband --- Paladin let her “choose” to wed one of the younger ones who was asking for her -- but the combination of his personality, her personality, and the whole situation have not been good for her. Nobody in this fic is perfect; Pervinca’a assistance to Ganelon was not the wisest of moves, but her actions were also not stemming from the same motivations as his. Thank you for your “essay” on this chapter/story. It’s interesting to see how thought-provoking it has been. More of Pervinca’s story and her fate will be dealt with in Chapter 24 (with three more story chapters to follow after).

pipinheart	Reviewed Chapter: 23 on 4/8/2005
A very nice story..Had me on the edge of my seat.... Diamond in search of flowers came upon more than that..Pippin saves her but her brother has other plans..I was afraid for farry...They get thier son back,and banish her brother,he is trouble... Keep it up.... Author Reply: Glad to hear you were on the edge of the seat, as I was worried about that this chapter either had not enough suspense or was too over-the-top. Diamond certainly did come upon much more in search for flowers, but her brave Knight came riding to the rescue. Her brother is Trouble, with a capital T... Four more story chapters to go. :)

Marion	Reviewed Chapter: 23 on 4/5/2005
Um, sorry, my spelling and grammar in that last post just went in all directions except the right one. That'll teach me to push the 'preview' button first before posting... Author Reply: s OK. I forgive you. = : ) (I cringe every time I screw such things up, too, esp. after writing a sort of grammar-fic in “Punctuation.”)

Marion	Reviewed Chapter: 23 on 4/5/2005
You know, Ganelon is a nasty piece of sht, but he's also a very unept piece of you-know-what. He's very efficient in manipulating his family, but did he really think that kidnapping the Heir of Tookland's son would work like that? Telling Pippin that his wife and son are staying with him... what did he expect? That Pippin would just shrug his shoulders and abandon his wife and son? This, I think, is the worst side of Ganelon's despicable character: he thinks he is righteous. He no doubt that, once confronted with Ganelon's accusation of licentiousness would cause Pippin to shrink before the righteousness that is Ganelon and flee like a curr to Tookland. Beware of people who are consider themselves so morally superior that they can commit crimes with impunity... (I checked the name. The 'real' Ganelon - Roland's stepfather - was punished for his treachery by being pulled limb from limb by four horses. Ironically 'our' Ganelon is being rejected by four farthings :-) Author Reply:* Criminal mastermind: an oxymoron. Most aren’t the brightest bulbs on the tree... You do have a great insight into Ganelon’s character (although it’s possible there was even more to his plan: he did purposefully send Pippin off on a particular path at first, and there were two lengths of rope missing. If he could just get Pippin out of the way, he probably thinks that he still has the control over Diamond that he is used to exercising over his family). He does think that he is righteous, that his wishes are all that matters, and that he can not only wrest control of his family but usurp (in Farry’s upbringing) the place of the Thain. I’m really enjoying how angry you are at Ganelon after this chapter. Also, your “rejection by four farthings” parallel made me laugh -- I hadn’t even thought of that! :)

Marion	Reviewed Chapter: 23 on 4/5/2005
Well, that clears some things up. Apparantly that whole... narrow attitude about sex, touching unwed males and females and propriety that Diamond displayed isn't native to the whole of the North Tooks, but something specific to Ganelon, who put his mark on his family. Honeysuckle abhorred sex, Gerin 'left her alone' and messed with servant girls and Ganelon took his 'lesson' from that. Ugh! What a family. I'm confused though, because it has been said in an earlier chapter that another North Took bride left her husband when she 'did his duty by him', so maybe that attitude mentioned above is not specific to Ganelon's family after all? But it did puzzle me, because they sounded so 'unhobbity'... I mean, sure, hobbits are stickler for formality and what is 'proper', but Diamonds family always sounded.. unhealthily proper to me.... Author Reply: I think it’s just Ganelon who’s that unhealthy and unhobbity -- and, wow, was he controlling that family! I choose to believe Gerin and Honeysuckle when they say that what he saw as a child (probably Gerin being friendly with the maid, giving her a hug or something while laughing at something she said that might have relieved him of some of the worry and oppression he felt while Honeysuckle was having one of her bad days) was something that Ganelon misconstrued and put the worst possible interpretation on. As for that other North Farthing bride, it’s possible there was more going on with that family than we know, too...and also that, just as a wanderer who goes off to sea or to Questing with his cousins shows up every so often in the regular Took line, that a bit more violent/greed-filled than usual hobbit, like Ganelon, shows up every so often among the descendants of Bandobras -- orc-slayer/inventor of golf with its head. (It’s also possible that a factor in that earlier reference was an author’s need to plant the seed of an idea in readers to create some will-she/won’t she leave tension. Sorry.) I couldn’t bring myself to have Ganelon’s original intention be to have harm come to Diamond (he left her a basket of food while she waited in the wood) because that did seem too unhobbity -- but he still does have the qualities that, had he lived in an earlier Age, would have made him close kin in personality to Smeagol.

Dreamflower	Reviewed Chapter: 23 on 4/5/2005
This was so exciting and suspenseful! I want to thank you right off the bat for two things: not making it a cliffhanger--thank goodness! And also, not killing Diamond off (not that I reall thought you would, but I've come across a couple of fics lately where they did, so I couldn't help but worry a bit.) Very glad to see how decisively Pippin dealt with the traitor. Ganelon was certainly well-named, as I have said from the beginning. It's a shame he is unlikely to learn from this and will probably become a troublemaker in exile. I feel sorry though, for Pippin when he realizes Pervinca's part in this. I hope that she, at least, will be able to finally realize that her brother is not in the same situation that she is, and come to terms with her own bitterness. But having reached this point makes me fear the story is winding down. I hope there is a good deal more to go. Author Reply: Thanks! Ever since my high school English teacher said I wasn’t able to make things evil/dramatic enough, I worry about it -- that, like Diamond’s conditioning from her “training,” is one of the “tapes” that plays in my own head. As for killing Diamond off - ack! While I do like angst, I just can’t bring myself to do that to any of the (cough...main) LOTR characters -- and, for me in this story, she has become one. Perhaps in old age...but, this being fiction, I don’t necessarily have to address that if I. Don’t. Wanna.: I can just ignore that part of their lives. Besides, how could I do that to Pippin? He needs her, and I have been promising, since the beginning, a happy ending... And, on the cliffhanger note, I did toy with it -- for a couple of minutes. But a) I have been getting really far behind in where I want to be on updates lately [sigh], which would change a cliffhanger from dramatic tension to really annoying to me as a reader, and b) it wouldn’t work structurally with the story -- sometimes the chapter titles influence what happens within them, as well as the other way around. [Oh, do I hate snakes...] I’m glad you liked how Pippin dealt with Ganelon, especially as I was a bit worried about stealing too much from your world of the Shire in the punishment. (The effect ends up being the same, since Pippin has friends everywhere in the Shire -- except perhaps the North Farthing, which Gerin has just acquiesced to having under Pippin’s order regarding this as well -- but he didn’t actually banish him into exile.) “I feel sorry though, for Pippin when he realizes Pervinca's part in this.” It’s entirely possible you’ll get to explore this emotion more in Chapter 24. ;) The story is, actually, winding down: lately, we’ve been getting into the “and to lead a people” section of the story summary, along with “making a marriage.” It’s possible I’ll write more in this time frame/setup of their adult lives, but I also have some other stories trying to get out. [No more multi-parters for me until I finish this one, though!] There are four story chapters left, plus a rather long author’s notes/bibliography which will explain obscure references within chapters and chapter titles -- as well as further confirm your speculation that Ganelon the traitor is well-named (and not just for his penchant for spouting dialogue that sounds suspiciously like medieval poetry). ;)

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