Reviews (59)

Author's reply

Oh, good! (relieved sigh) I thought you were referring to a fanfic author whose "real name" I didn't know. Frankly, at this point in the holiday season, I'm not sure I would've recognized "John Ronald" if you had written that. "John Ronald Reuel" might have stirred the embers glowing in my brainspace. Maybe. But maybe not. I have eaten too much festive fare and badly need to go back to plain fare once more. My brain seems to run better on dark chocolate than on homemade fudge and Christmas cookies. Ah, but it was delicious while it lasted. Happy New Year's Eve to you! I have more chapters I've wanted to post (to this story, Bill's story, and two of Bilbo's stories), but this week has been busy, and typing them in from the written draft takes time. It will be nice to settle into a routine again, hopefully returning to writing an hour or two daily and then typing in and posting new chapters on Monday and Friday as I was doing before the holidays hit. And Happy New Year to you and yours (and everyone else who reads this...)!

Author's reply

I have thought of Arthur often since retiring and taking up where I left off in the world of fanfic. He gave so many people so much pleasure and food for thought! His stories are high on my want-to-(re)read list. (I'm sorry to say I don't recognize your mention of John Robert; have I forgotten someone? I hope not. Did I miss someone else's passing during the time I was away? I often think of the people whose comments I used to see on my and other people's stories and hope they merely found a different fandom or pastime and that they are not among the casualties of the passing of time or current events.) Oh, yes, the Cliff House! I will happily bring fudgy brownies and mulled wine, and the Muse promises piña coladas and dark chocolate if she doesn't fall asleep in the corner before the gathering starts. (Usually I'm the one plying her with such to try to jolly her into a good-enough mood to tell a story...) For candles, my choice would be something woodsy-smelling. Maybe a mix of cedar, pine, and forest-floor-mulch with a hint of woodsmoke added to emulate a fire on the hearth (the television is currently displaying a brightly burning Yule log in lieu of a hearth). For music, I discovered a wonderful collection of Celtic-style Christmas music on YouTube this morning, posted by an Irish radio station, I think. ["Celtic Classic Christmas Carols 2025 (Full Album)" is the title, and the YouTube channel is @RadioRuach for anyone who might want to look it up. Another YouTube video that popped up this morning was a deleted scene from The Hobbit, posted by @MiddleEarthUpdates – you can find it in their list of "Shorts" by the (thumbnail?) picture of Bilbo holding an acorn between his finger and thumb and looking up over his shoulder. I found it the perfect short scene to contemplate on a Christmas morning, focusing on choosing hope in the midst of chaos and destruction. But please also accept my apologies for tempting you to go to YouTube when you have been limiting your screen time...] Anyhow, I love the idea of holding vigil for old and current friends and waiting for the Light to return. I will be happy to join you in quietness and contemplation and celebration of our many blessings, including and especially the people we have known.

Author's reply

It's so good to hear from you, and congratulations on successfully learning to limit your screen time! I have cut my laptop time down significantly since retiring, though I still try to write (and/or read) for an hour or two a day. I've set a goal of finishing all my WIPs, prioritizing the ones that are already published, though I've also been working through the unpublished stories as well. I always hated coming to the end of a story and finding out it wasn't the end and the story was still "in progress" but the author had stopped posting updates. (Cutting back on my smartphone use? That hasn't happened... but I'll attribute it to listening to an audiobook, music, or the occasional podcast for much of the day. Often, I'm not even listening, really; but just having the background noise helps me concentrate on what I'm doing, somehow. Rather than distracting me, a steady stream of voices or music anchors me in some way.) So my plan is to keep posting. At the risk of sounding pitiful, I often feel as if I'm just talking to myself these days, or that something has gone wrong with my writing – I've lost the storytelling touch, or some such – when I see a long line of zeros in the "Reviews" column of the chapter listing. I know it's all nonsense. People are busy, and often they can't think of something to say or feel is worth saying. That said, I'd find pity (i.e. people posting throwaway comments just to soothe my insecure closet-monster) equally distressing. (Honestly, sometimes I can't help laughing at myself. Silly Lin!) I'm very grateful to the mods who are continuing to keep SoA going. Their efforts are allowing me to post new chapters (yes, I really ought to make the effort to get used to other archives' ways of doing things and cross-post), as well as work my way through the many stories on my long, long, want-to-read list that are hosted here on this archive. Anyhow, may you and yours enjoy this blessed time, and thanks so much for stopping by and pausing long enough to share your thoughts!

Author's reply

That's something my parents shared: they loved words and word-plays. My siblings and I heard (and offered) a lot of puns growing up in that household, along with the oft-quoted "A pun is the lowest form of humor." (Despite the repetition, that particular criticism never seemed to slow down the flow of puns, in any event.)

Author's reply

There's a whole world out there that he never even suspected, really. (I think of a girl I knew who won a scholarship to study overseas. The selection committee picked her out of a pool of promising candidates, all with similar credentials, because she had never traveled more than 25 miles from her hometown until then.)

Author's reply

One of the features I fell in love with here were the Mountains, both in their snow-capped majesty from afar and their rugged beauty (and myriad waterfalls!) close-up. The other attraction was the restless Sea, ever changing yet always somehow the same, and the wild and rocky coastline. It's no wonder that this was the area where I ultimately sank my roots. The best of all worlds!

Author's reply

I'm rather irked by the idea of class differences, even as I write about how I imagine they worked in the Shire. I love your imagined quote: "We love them for solving problems, but how does one understand them?" (Still, Sam didn't seem to have a problem in that area, luckily for all of the Shire and Middle-earth in the end.) I wonder if the three tribes of Hobbits Tolkien devised reflected different people-groups in Tolkien's England or historical England? (Perhaps the Fallohides might equate to Arthur Pendragon's people, whom I've heard called "Romanized Britons", or Alfred the Great, a Saxon king, I think, during the Viking invasion?) Or am I reaching too far in trying to find a correlation?

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In addition to children and young adolescents, we've had several dogs over the years who displayed magical thinking, including Panda. Another was a Labrador who thought if she stared at the ball long enough, it would magically fly through the air. (Thanks!)

Author's reply

That's a truism, for certain. I should imagine that there's a Shire proverb to that effect, perhaps even coined by Bilbo at some point. Thanks!

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I'm glad! Thanks so much for stopping to leave an encouraging word.

Author's reply

MM! In the interest of smoothing the way for Chapter 37, here's my advice (and pardon me for being long-winded or too detailed; I'm feeling foggy today, probably the sudden change in the weather): What I typically do when a chapter has material that could be triggering is to place a warning at the top of the chapter. I wish I'd thought of it earlier, actually. I should probably look back through a couple of the older stories with an eye to providing some buffers/warnings/summaries. Thus, at the top of this chapter, your warning might say something like: Trigger Warning: This chapter describes (Provide a brief summary of chapter) and includes a potentially upsetting description of thoughts of self-harm. Finish the trigger warning by telling the reader your solution and giving them the choice to read or skip. For example, you might arrange for the reader to skip the entire chapter, promising to put a summary at the top of the next chapter. Alternatively, you might use formatting tricks to set off the "problem" text (see next paragraph) and tell the reader in your warning text what part of the chapter to skim over/skip. If this is the chapter where Éowyn meets Faramir and you don't want readers to miss the whole chapter, you might put the dream part in italic font – in the warning at the top of the chapter, you'd inform the reader to skip the part(s) in italic font. Or if part of the chapter is upsetting but the rest is not, and the upsetting part can be separated from the rest, you can tell the reader in your warning to start or stop reading at the "break" (in my chapters, breaks are indicated by a line containing only three asterisks *** ), depending on where the upsetting material occurs in the chapter. In A Took by any Other Name, I ran Chapter 5 by Nilmandra to ask her if it was too graphic for the site. It was too graphic for her (ouch), but she helped me with the site features to make the chapter work. There's a setting when you publish a chapter (which I've seldom needed to use as I try to keep everything PG13 or under) that pops up a protective wall of sorts warning that the chapter contains material of a serious or graphic nature and asking the reader to check a box to verify that they are an adult. In addition to invoking that function, I put the following note at the top of the chapter: Warning: This chapter contains material of a violent and graphic nature. If such disturbs you, all you need to know is that Esmeralda, Diamond, and finally Estella, clarify the treatment of Orcs of their captives, according to Diamond's understanding from having overheard Pippin's nightmares over the years. I think that providing a brief summary like this can help the reader avoid that FOMO feeling. (fear of missing out, just in case that acronym is unfamiliar. Even with the amount of time I've spent online over the past decades, I still run across acronyms here and there that I have to look up.) In A Matter of Appearances, I hit on the idea of placing a note at the top of the web page warning sensitive readers not to read the chapter, and promising to put a summary of the problematic chapter(s) at the top of the next chapter to be published. Here's the series of notes that resulted as I figured out this strategy: Chapter 25 Note to the Reader: We now enter the territory of true horror, and sad to say, this chapter split itself in half. The next chapter is, if anything, worse. If you are sensitive, please skip this chapter, and chapter 26. Firmly PG-13. Chapter 26 Note to the Reader: Still horror, but the tide is beginning to turn by the end. If you are sensitive, please skip this chapter. Firmly PG-13. There will be a short summary at the beginning of Chapter 27, so you won't miss any plot points if you choose to skip the horror. And thank you for your patience. Chapter 27 This chapter is milder than the previous two, but still PG. Summary, as promised: In Chapter 25, Woodruff, having come down with a high fever, interrupted Ferdi’s burial, insisting that she be lowered into the grave to check for a heartbeat. While in the middle of this endeavour, she fainted and was borne away, and the burial resumed. Meanwhile, Sam’s part of the muster found the club-wielder’s back trail and began to follow it in hopes of finding the rest of the ruffians, and Farry. Eventually they found that there were two ruffians at the Three-Farthing Stone, and so they split up to pursue both trails. At the same time, Farry was being used as a visual aid in a lecture on how to cut up kidnap victims (lecture only, demonstration to follow). The lecture continued in Chapter 26, and upon its conclusion the youngest ruffian was ordered to take certain “tokens” from Farry, to be left where hobbits would find them and bring them to Farry’s father. The plan was to distract the Thain with grief and horror, affecting his ability to lead a muster, allowing the ruffians to make their escape. However, the young ruffian, finding a stray lamb stranded in some thorn bushes, was at the chapter’s end considering a substitute for the requisite items... Anyhow, I hope some or all of this helps. Woo-hoo, Chapter 37 is on the way! Please convey my thanks to your beta-hubs. (((hugs))) Lin Author Reply: Ah. I found an example of where I used a "break" symbol as mentioned in my earlier reply. At the top of Chapter 39 in A Matter of Apperances is a note that reads as follows: A/N: A little bit of housekeeping here, tying up a loose end or two, and since EF did the research for me I have gone ahead and written the details into the start of this chapter. There is a bit of uncomfortable detail in the first half of this chapter, where Sam and Tolly finish their vigil just outside the Bounds, preparing to take the word back to Tookland that the last of the ruffians have been dealt with. If you do not wish to read the details, please skip to the second half, which begins immediately after the three-asterisk (***) break. Take heart. The celebrations are about to begin. With the conclusion of this chapter we leave death and horror behind.

Author's reply

MM! I will await the appearance of Chapter 37 with bated breath! Free days to read are precious (deliberately *not* said in Gollum's voice). I am glad to hear from you and hope you're enjoying this story. It has worked out to be much less angsty than some of my previous efforts (there's still some angst, of course, despite the temptation to write fluff and more fluff and nothing but fluff...). Of course, the angst in these early chapters is more or less left over from the previous stories leading into this point on my timeline. I'm having way too much fun with young hobbits in the later chapters... I love writing scenes where Merry and Ferdi draw on their shared experience (they're only one year apart in age) in dealing with Pippin. I'm so glad you liked the discussion here. Alas, poor Pippin. Y'know, I loved the brave-carefree-cheerful-resourceful tween so much in the book, I probably wouldn't have made him Thain if Tolkien hadn't already done so. The best I could do was to emphasize how much hobbits hate having to take leadership roles, as a norm (though there are exceptions, like Lotho), and how seriously leaders like Merry and Pippin and Sam take their roles as a sacred duty to keep the Shire and Shire-folk free and relatively untroubled. Whew, I'm feeling much too philosophical at the moment. I need to polish up Bill's next chapter and post it while I'm still in the mood to type and the cats are still feeling mellow and leaving me in peace (at least for the moment). (((hugs))) Lin

Author's reply

It may take rather more than a chapter or two to reach Rivendell (there's a key event that happens in this part of the story that did *not* happen during the original Travellers' journey), but hopefully those intervening chapters will be interesting in themselves. For its part, Rivendell was a challenge to imagine, considering how much has changed since Frodo was there with Sam and Merry and Pippin and Bilbo. But hopefully it'll ring true. And, of course, new characters will be added to the travelling party at that point. I can't promise to write a story set in someone else's universe (it's hard enough to fulfill my desire to be true to Tolkien's vision), but I will think about it. Your story idea sounds intriguing (and potentially humorous). Author Reply: I forgot to answer your question about Jewels... Actually, Pippin's time in Gondor is a separate short story that I'm hoping to post on September 22 in honor of Ring Day. (I just have to finish it, first...) So while Jewels will mention in passing the holiday in Gondor, the details of the journey will be found in a separate story so as not to swell Jewels to unwieldy proportions. Thanks!

Author's reply

Poor Pippin-lad. When I was first working out who should fall in over his head (Pippin's son? or his namesake?), it seemed to work out as the final version tells, especially considering Pip-lad's later troubles with excessive heat. After all, once you've had heat exhaustion or heat stroke, you're more susceptible to heat-related illness, or so I understand. Cheers for Haldoron! He doesn't face the same constraints as Ferdi who, even though he's Farry's uncle, is technically lower in status than the son of the Thain. Ferdi is conditioned (not only by the society he grew up in but by all his years of experience) to respond in a certain way, and even at this early point in their journey, Haldoron is recognizing that fact and intervening when he sees fit. What he's learning is how to lead Hobbits without condescending to them. I suppose that might be called cooperation? Thanks! Author Reply: (Or maybe I mean "interact with" rather than "lead"?)

Author's reply

Ferdi's cousins have sometimes joked that he's half-pony, and he certainly lives up to his reputation here. I think I wrote this chapter immediately after writing several chapters of Bill's story, so I was feeling very sympathetic to a pony's point of view. Yup, this journey was intended as a learning experience in more ways than one, and I think it will more than live up to those expectations... even for those who are not actually walking with them. Thanks!

Author's reply

Happy Labor Day to you, as well! I am spending my Labor Day very pleasantly – reading fanfic and writing reviews, along with writing replies to reviews of my own chapters. Thanks so much for hitting the highlights in your review! I think you're right – this journey will be life-changing for everyone, with lots of opportunities for growth and learning. What would a visit to the Stone Trolls be without a song, indeed? Again, thanks for reading and pausing to share your thoughts. I do appreciate it.

Author's reply

Hobbits seem naturally to be more "talkers" than "doers" most of the time. Ah, but then there's that seed of courage said to be found deep in the heart of the fattest and most timid hobbit... Thanks! I really appreciate the lovely comments you've left on the chapters of this story. (It's late, so I will answer more reviews after a night's sleep.)

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His stubbornness will stand him in good stead, I think, helped along by his competence. And I think his conversation with Pippin was an eye-opener, to say the least. Thanks!

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Poor Ferdi, indeed. I always used to hate preparing for camping trips. Once we got to the campsite and set up, I was fine – even wishing we could stay longer! (At least until we ran out of food and clean underwear.) But then, that was camping. As in staying in one place, in the woods, by the ocean or a stream. Resting in a camp chair and reading a book whilst the wee hobbits ran wild and free, more or less, returning to our campsite when they got hungry or when twilight started to come down. The longest backpacking trip I ever made was across the Teton range, much shorter than walking from Bree to Gondor by way of Imladris... and my hiking partner, an experienced backpacker, pretty much did all the planning since she knew what we were doing much better than I did. Thanks!

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He's definitely getting some "insider knowledge". Bergil will provide additional insights, I'm sure, as will Gimli and Legolas. Thanks!

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Hah. I'm sure he told her all about the original plan, but you're right... he hasn't quite figured out how to tell her about the revised plan at this point, even though he knows that sooner would be better than later. Thanks!

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Let me add my Yikes! to yours... That was one of the most difficult stories I ever wrote. Pippin's ability to manipulate his cousins over the years is related to his insight into people. At least at this point in his life, he's using this talent for good and not selfish reasons. (I bet he'd like to send more of his Tookish cousins along in the hopes that they might form a better opinion of Men.) Thanks!

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I hadn't thought of that! But when I think about it, Ferdi has recently discovered that Faramir is something of a prodigy when it comes to shooting. (The lad hid his talent for years, and Ferdi only found out because he witnessed Farry's accuracy during their recent mishap in the Woody End.) Thanks!

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This thought made me laugh aloud, summoning one of the cats to rub against my knee. ("Aren't you done yet? I have an appointment with your lap for my afternoon nap!") I even wonder if the thought might expand during the journey to one of them asking the other, "And just what did your cousin get us into?" (grin) Thanks!

Author's reply

I was away from the laptop all day, so whatever was wrong must have fixed itself! I'm glad you were able to access the new chapter. Thanks so much for trying again, and reading, and pausing long enough to mention the things that you liked about the chapter!