Reviews (3)

I read this about two years ago and then just today felt the urge to read it again and revel in it. This is one of the most beautiful pre-Quest stories I've ever read....one of the best stories, period. You create flawless characterizations of all of them with just a few little hints...not just adventurous Pippin but Fatty the dandy and Folco the stolid. It's so rare to find stories where the hobbits are *real*, neither short men nor children, and you do it. The description is beautiful, the entire sense of a warm autumn afternoon is so pervasive you can almost feel the sun and smell the leaves. The glimpses into Merry's life are amazing. You have the material and character development to create an epic, and instead you simply create this flawless single portrait in miniature. I love the structure of the story too, especially the way each part begins with someone dismissing Merry...until the end, when someone is actually LOOKING for him. And I honestly get goosebumps at "Fatty's reliable, I think." and that entire conversation. And how fitting that this be when the conspiracy is born. Simply phenomenal in every way. Thank you for writing this.

What a lovely story. Quite a different take on Saradoc - but quite understandable. Poor Merry - it seems as if he, for once, is the one who really needs support. I loved the times and the development over the course of one day.

I really enjoyed this story. You've done a very good job of depicting Merry's anxieties and their resolution. Miles and miles and uncounted miles away from his foolish young cousin, still trying to pretend he did not pine for days when Frodo Baggins was the elder brother to make up for all those elder brothers of which early graves had robbed him, and Meriadoc Brandybuck was allowed to be a child, careless and companionable, and did not have to work and think and neglect his friends and be serious and solemn and make Buckland thrive as never before because otherwise his father’s failures would count for something and people would know... This is very powerful and well done!