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Passover and Pilgrimage by Larner	9 Review(s)
PSW	Reviewed Chapter: Author's Notes on 10/13/2016
This is a wonderful story! I've never thought of a pilgrimage along the places of the major events at the end of the Third Age, but I can absolutely see it happening. I wonder how Sam would feel about seeing it all again -- I think that it's quite likely to be as this story shows...but I wonder also if there isn't a chance that he wouldn't have wanted to go along at all. I don't know... But, fantastic imagining of what became of Mount Doom. Thanks for writing!

Queen Galadriel	Reviewed Chapter: Author's Notes on 5/11/2011
This is lovely! To see those who loved Frodo best make that journey, and find the beautiful lake there, and Frodo's true dream...I love it. My own roommate is just beginning to discover her family's Jewish heritage, and celebrated her first Passover with her family this year. I'm going to tell her about this one. Author Reply: Once Sauron was cast down, how wonderful it must have been for the Valar to be able to see Mordor again take its place as one of the living lands again. And blessings on your roommate as she learns more about the history of her people--it is a rich and blessed one! Tell her Mazeltov for me! (And when I kosher silverware that accidently managed to get onto my decidedly NON-kosher plates, I love intoning "In the Name of the Father, and ..." loudly enough to rankle Jeannette! Heh!)

Little Mouse	Reviewed Chapter: Author's Notes on 12/6/2009
Hi. :) I have recently become a fan of your writings, I believe either because you reviewed my story or because I kept seeing your name on the main page, I can't remember which. Regardless, you are a very gifted writer, and I have enjoyed "catching up" with your stories. You have also managed, with this story, to make me do something that is incredibly rare for me: I cried. The scene at Orodruin brought tears to my eyes. I couldn't help it; it so perfectly captured what happened there and the healing of the land. Absolutely beautiful. I, too, am a Christian who fully appreciates Jewish traditions, and it is wonderful to see an author who honors Tolkein's world by subtly including the faith just as he did. Excellent work. I look forward to reading more. :) Author Reply: I am so sorry I've not responded until now, but this last month has been fraught with stresses. Please forgive me. Thank you so for your lovely comments. The roommate with whom I spent most of my college years was Orthodox, so I developed a firm appreciation of her beliefs and customs, for which I am grateful. And to learn that something I've written has moved another person emotionally is always a reaffirming moment. Thank you, thank you for letting me know. I live in the Pacific Northwest, and visits to Crater Lake have always been delightful. That a similar thing might have occurred there in the ruins of Orodruin just seemed so possible.... Again, thank you so very much. And may the new year bring you much joy!

Little Mouse	Reviewed Chapter: Author's Notes on 12/6/2009
Hi. :) I have recently become a fan of your writings, I believe either because you reviewed my story or because I kept seeing your name on the main page, I can't remember which. Regardless, you are a very gifted writer, and I have enjoyed "catching up" with your stories. You have also managed, with this story, to make me do something that is incredibly rare for me: I cried. The scene at Orodruin brought tears to my eyes. I couldn't help it; it so perfectly captured what happened there and the healing of the land. Absolutely beautiful. I, too, am a Christian who fully appreciates Jewish traditions, and it is wonderful to see an author who honors Tolkein's world by subtly including the faith just as he did. Excellent work. I look forward to reading more. :)

Celeritas	Reviewed Chapter: Author's Notes on 7/6/2009
Sea-longing due to lembas, eh? Then presumably Turin would have had it as well, and so many others... Interesting idea, but it's a tough sell on me. The transformative experiences of the Quest are enough for me to understand why Merry and Pippin would not feel at home in the Shire at the end of their days. I also still have to be a tad skeptical--not necessarily about how much Sam, Merry, and Pippin would know about the Powers (you've convinced me there) but how much they would vocalize it. It all still seems to be a great sort of mystery that would be difficult to communicate, even to one another. When you've gained a huge spiritual insight on life that no one else in your culture knows of it can be difficult to share. On the other side of that of course is the fact that these are not in the Shire, and that this is in a world where Aragorn has reinstituted the Numenorean practice of Eruism. There would have to have been during some period after the long scholarly decline in the Third Age a revival of information, especially cosmological/Elvish/religious to have accompanied that. It's the only thing that can explain why we know so much more than the characters in LotR! Very interesting stuff. The arguments on how Valarin 4th Age Gondor (feat. hobbits) is can go either way, but I'd really like to see your take on the effect of lembas on Turin! Author Reply: Here I am going by what Tolkien himself wrote, that in mortals lembas had a tendency to awaken the Sea Longing and other Elvish appetites. I think he wrote that prior to deciding they were the M.E. version of Communion Hosts, by the way. And perhaps part of the reason Turin so often felt out of step with the world was because he did experience the Sea Longing and had no idea what it was he was feeling. Although he was a heavily conflicted character from the start. I doubt that Merry, Pippin, and Sam would talk often about the Powers with anyone but one another (and even then but rarely) and perhaps other members of the Fellowship and perhaps the twins or Glorfindel. As you note, it would be very hard to explain to most Hobbits, although I suspect that from time to time they might come across one or two Hobbits who might understand at least a little bit, for a moment or two, at least. But here with Aragorn and Faramir, I do believe they would be more open, particularly with Aragorn whom Tolkien himself describes in his letters as renewing the lineage of the Priest-Kings. Don't know if I'll ever tackle Turin. His is one part of the Sil I remember best, and I've read The Children of Hurin as well. But dealing with Turin himself--Tolkien did so very well by him it's hard to imagine dealing with him myself. I'll think about it! Thanks, Celeritas!

Kitty	Reviewed Chapter: Author's Notes on 6/27/2009
As usual, your AN give a great insight into your thoughts and what moved you to write this story in the first place. Have to agree about the knowledge of these four Hobbits about Elves, and about the Maiar and Valar. They were no common Hobbits who never left the Shire and for whom the world outside their borders doesn't exist, after all. And even if at the beginning only Frodo and maybe Sam knew a bit, I am sure that changed through their contacts outside. You listed a lot of reasons for that, and I completely agree. Merry and Pippin would never have retired to Gondor if they had remained so ignorant and insular as they were when they left the Shire for the first time. So many Hobbits are barely journeying inside the Shire, after all, much less outside of it, so I think it took something quite strong to draw them out of their home for good in the end. And I doubt it was only to be close to their friends from the quest, so there had to be more to it, among it the need to be close to someone who understood them, who could give them what no other Hobbit could. Thank you for another great story, Larner! Author Reply: You have stated it so succinctly, Kitty. Thank you so! I enjoyed writing this story, and although I'm sorry as to how long it took to write it, I'm glad it is finally posted at last. Thank you ever so much!

Inzilbeth	Reviewed Chapter: Author's Notes on 6/24/2009
A most wonderful essay, Larner, with all the points you raised being very well reasoned and researched. It was, of course, an absolute stroke of genius on Tolkien's part to write a religious story without any overt religion being included within the text, leaving the tale open to all to interpret as their own beliefs dictate. I felt your reasoning behind the hobbits' knowledge of Elves and the Valar to be spot-on and you highlighted a concern I had myself when writing about the use of the Elosterion Palantir in Aman. Very well done! Author Reply: Thank you, Inzilbeth. Tolkien wrote a classic to which folk all over the world resonate! And I LOVE playing in his world and exploring it! Am so glad you agree about the Hobbits' growing understanding of the nature of the Valar and Maiar and fellow races dwelling within Middle Earth. And am so glad I'm not the only one who wonders about the Elosterion Palantir! Thanks again, so very much.

Dreamflower	Reviewed Chapter: Author's Notes on 6/23/2009
Wonderful notes! I always appreciate seeing your thinking and what led you to write as you did. I tend to agree with you, that having once been exposed to the thinking and beliefs of other races, and having met Elves themselves and seen prophecies fulfilled, Merry, Pippin and Sam would have returned with a far greater understanding and belief in the Powers of the West. Whether they would have been open about their new understanding might still be in question, but I do believe that post-Quest, there would have been a few hobbits who now believed and understood what pre-Quest was always dismissed as "traveller's tales" "news from Bree" and "moonshine". And of course, many in the Shire would still continue their dismissals! Author Reply: Oh, I agree. Most Hobbits might think little of the stories told; but that the Thain, Master, and Mayor all take the news of a King Returned seriously; and more than just Bilbo Baggins and innkeepers along the Road now welcome and entertain Dwarves and possibly Elves has to have given many of their folk and neighbors a degree of pause. The world has changed indeed, and the son of the Thain, the Son of the Hall, and the new Master of Bag End, all of them influential folk, had to have come home and made it clear they had friends who were NOT Hobbits and that those friends were to be treated respectfully when they were encountered. They might not discuss their appreciation for the Powers freely, but there had to be times when such appreciation could be seen by others and at least commented upon. Most would still brush it off as peculiarities picked up "out there," but there would be at least some who would begin questioning their own preconceptions, I'd think. Thank so very much, Dreamflower.

shirebound	Reviewed Chapter: Author's Notes on 6/23/2009
Denied Sam’s right to sail, they instead resort to the company of those who would be most likely to appreciate the ineffable urges they know themselves—Aragorn, his Queen, and Legolas (and possibly Gimli as well), all of whom have also eaten lembas and likely heard the call of the gulls and waves. Oh my, how fascinating. What a thoughtful and perceptive essay. Author Reply: Thank you. I dealt with many of the same issues when I wrote "Longing," and at one site had a number of folk inform me that they could not accept that Pippin and Merry would know so much about Elven cosmology. All I could say was, "Why not? How can you expect Pippin, in his nineties now, and Merry, who's over a hundred, to be as callow as they were in their twenties and early thirties?" I know I am not the one I was at nineteen; and certainly my grandmother wasn't the same as she was at twenty-one when she died a month and a half short of her ninety-sixth birthday. If Pippin gave Aragorn his copy of the Red Book and Bilbo and Frodo's Translations from the Elvish, and if Merry went to Rivendell to study, it follows that they themselves had been studying, and were likely seeking answers to their own questions as to what Frodo had chosen. And even if they didn't have to live for days and days on lembas as was true of Frodo and Sam, they still did eat them, and the combination of the lembas and the Ent draughts probably helped them heal as well as they did from what was done to them during the orc-hauling through Rohan. It's likely that they, too, felt the Sea Longing to some extent, and that once the anchors of their wives and Sam's presence were cut it made it more likely they, too, would drift away from the Shire. And where better to find oneself in such a situation than at the side of others who are likely feeling many of the same urges to give over this life and sail away to Valinor? Anyway, again, thank you so!

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