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Nor Bid the Stars Farewell  by Levade 34 Review(s)
elizaReviewed Chapter: 2 on 7/18/2015
ooh poor Legolas. Such a haunting, emotional chapter Levade. I'm glad you got to play with Eilian for a while, he is a wonderful character.
Whew, I'm hoping the terrible two's can help legolas for a while.
Can't wait for the next chapter.

Wonderful story

Author Reply: Hi Eliza,

Eilian is so wonderful he stuck in my head for all these years only to show up completely unexpected. :) I hope the story continues up to your standards -- I'm not usually a person to delve deeply into emotional issues in stories or Legolas' life, so thank you for letting me know it's working for you!

daw the minstrelReviewed Chapter: 2 on 7/18/2015
I'm really enjoying seeing Eilian here, but I have to tell you, every time I see your world bloom around him, I blink, then smile and rearrange my head. It started with Glorfindel's horse having the same name as the person I think of as Legolas's sister-in-law! Anyway, this is fun.

One of the things I think makes for depth in a story is using a character's memories to reverberate off the story's present. I'd never thought about how wonderfully that would work with Glorfindel. He's seen so much. His insight into the powerful effect of a dragon is just right here, and I like the way you stress the "wrongness" of dragons rather than seeing them as just another of dangerous creatures that populate ME.

But the Valar help us all:

He would find some way to get to Khazad-dûm. To be so near and not be able to go there was ...what was one of Elladan's words? Unimaginable!

I don't know whether to wish Glorfindel knew Elrohir was thinking that so he could take measures or be glad he doesn't, because he'd have a heart attack.

I sympathized with Elladan's worry over the baby dragon's mother. As Glorfindel says, the hearts of the young are tender. A friend's son once asked his mother what she was cooking, and she said leg of lamb, and he was just horrified. He wanted to know how the lamb would walk. She actually told him the lamb had been given an artificial leg. She couldn't stand to disillusion him. The question Elladan ponders is such a big one. It's basically what is the nature of evil. How do we judge it?

This was a nice link between story bits:

It could have done what Legolas could not - it could have flown home to its mother!

Legolas is so heartbreaking here, though I had to smile when Eilian marvels that Legolas is so young that he's even younger than the tree.

Author Reply: Alfirin is.... Oops! This is what happens when I do go back and re-read your stories closely enough. I just went to a Sindarin-English dictionary and found a nice flower name. XD

Writing Legolas young, or at all really, has been weird. There are SO many stories with him in it but the thing with the dragon and Thranduil stuck with me and I wondered if that was where Legolas' mother had died. I suppose we'll see eventually.

I know Eilian here is so different from how you wrote him, Daw. If I do another story after this I'll go back and read your stories again to make sure I hit closer to the mark. Thank you for keeping on with this!

NilmandraReviewed Chapter: 1 on 7/17/2015
further up, further in Indeed. Secret flame or the Imperishable beyond the circles of the world - you are making me homesick.

Love the start and the setting, and showing the unique character of each of the twins. I am very much looking forward to them meeting Eilian and Legolas.

Author Reply: I think Glorfindel, while happy where he is, in some ways longs for the _more_ that he found after death. Sounds odd to most people, but it's how I see it. A little nod to C.S. Lewis, that.

Thank you, Nilmandra! I always think of Dragon and your twins when writing them. You two set the bar high for me!

daw the minstrelReviewed Chapter: 1 on 7/17/2015
Holy crap, Levade. Those are incredibly kind words. Thank you.

I love the idea of Glorfindel being sent back to guard Elrond and his kin with a perspective that's hard for me, anyway, to grasp.

Death was but a passage, a journey further up, further in

I like the way you differentiate the two boys. They're distinct and yet both at a consequential moment, crossing boundary into part of life they only vaguely grasp.

So you see this:

he was a child trembling on the cusp of something more and sometimes it terrified him

And this:

Glorfindel kept his ideas of what the twins' parents were doing in their absence to himself


Author Reply: Ah well, what good are the words we would tell people once we're gone? Might as well say them now and make sure they're heard. :) Besides, it's true. Fandom can beat you up and spit you out, so when you realize there are people who were more than kind and friendly and encouraged you, I think they should hear it. And you do write some honest, memorable reviews! :D I hope Eilian isn't too 'other' for you. I'll be posting the next chapter where he and Legolas show up today and then chewing nails to hope you don't want to hunt me down for writing Eilian so poorly!

I've written Glorfindel a long time, and the older I get the more I can see the way Tolkien saw how fearless he was. What did he fear? He'd died already and death held no secrets. I think he had the secret of living a full life and knowing what came after was, to him, not to be feared but embraced as the next, fuller step to a greater country. Or maybe I'm stepping on Gandalf's toes there. ;)

Thank you, Daw!

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