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On Solid Ground  by Lindelea 6 Review(s)
hobbitsrcuteReviewed Chapter: 17 on 4/27/2004
YAY! Ferdi can seeeeeeeeeeeeeeee


wonderful as always, my dear. simply wonderful!!!!!!!!!!

Author Reply: O thank you! Appreciate the encouragement!

FantasyFanReviewed Chapter: 17 on 2/23/2004
Mondays are so wonderful, because I get to catch up on so much lovely writing that I didn't get to see on the busy weekend.

You've painted a very dramatic picture of the four women of the Shire standing together, waiting for the bodies of those they love to be brought out. Hope has been sustained for a long time, but when it comes to the moment when you will have to lift the shroud and have hopes ended, and then go on, it takes more strength than is possible to hold back tears.

I am so happy for Nell and Ferdi. I had a sneaking suspicion that you would be giving Ferdi back his eyesight, way back at the beginning when he was having the bad headaches for no obvious reason, but I didn't say anything at all for fear you would decide not to do it. Then all the time in the dark, I wondered if he would see a light when they broke through. This was a much better way to do it, with Ferdi unconscious and his first sight Nell's face. How beautiful for them, almost a reward for their steadfast love through troubles and grief. I can't imagine how overwhelming it would be to see your children for the first time after so many years in the dark.

Farry and Goldi have an enduring love too, young as they still are. Canon says they get married, and Frodo says that Farry will be Thain, and his children after him, but Goldi doesn't know that. She's determined to make his ending as happy as possible, any way she can. I don't know if there's precedent for marrying an unconscious hobbit, is there? I doubt she's interested in the legal niceties, though. She's got an ally in Estella, who also knows that it feels right. Was it always planned for Merry to do the wedding? Would Pip have performed the ceremony had the quake not happened, or would he have stood with his son?

PS - I loved Siggy's not too subtle threat to Pippin - drink up and don't give me any grief, I'm too busy to coddle you today. I'm not sure that there's any tougher training in the Shire than to be a healer of Tooks. You really need to write a story of the healer's convention - you could make it absolutely hilarious.

Author Reply: I have been planning since "Merlin" to give Ferdi back his eyesight just as happened. What fun to get to this chapter -- finally!

I don't know about precedent, but since hobbits seldom marry twice I figured it would not be scandalous, but rather sad and sweet instead. Yes, it was always planned for Merry to do the wedding. Somehow it seems to me that a father shouldn't have to perform the ceremony for his own children, but should be able to stand by his wife's side to watch the fledgling fly the nest. Thus either Merry or Pippin could perform the wedding in the "Merrys" story, but not Sam; and Merry has to perform the wedding in this story, neither Sam nor Pippin.

LOL. I can just imagine that convention. Workshops on vile-tasting draughts, dealing with Tooks, snappy comebacks to irritable comments...

Bob's Your UncleReviewed Chapter: 17 on 2/21/2004
Farry's not concious but still getting hitched? At least that's better than in France where you can marry a dead person if you can prove you planned to get married before your partner passed on and obtain presidential approval. I guess Farry's agreement to a wedding would count as an 'I do' - or were he and Goldi handfasted?

Author Reply: Hullo, Uncle Bob, glad to hear from you!

I had never heard about that quaint little French custom. Odd. Has anyone actually gone ahead and done that?

I don't know if they were handfasted, haven't written a handfasting for them anyhow. But going by Tolkien's description of "strict monogamy" I figure that once two hobbits agree to wed, they're already wedded in their hearts, unless it's an arranged marriage (yes, as a matter of fact, those happen too in these stories), in which case the two are determined to make it work (got that idea from the mother and father in "Fiddler on the Roof" as a matter of fact). Divorce and separation are unthought-of in their world.

Gee, did that last paragraph make sense? It's time to sign off and seek the pillow.

Thanks for reviewing.

HaiReviewed Chapter: 17 on 2/21/2004
Oh, dear unburied but not alright yet! I'm so glad that Ferdi can see again!! Maybe he was blind in the first place so that he wouldn't be incapacitated in this darkness! I hope they can get Faramir back! At least Frodo has already sent his spirit back I hope it can find it's way back to the body! Looking forward to more, thank you!

Author Reply: You hit the nail on the head, Hai, this story was in the planning since before "Merlin" was written, although the blind hobbit was not originally planned to be Ferdibrand, but someone else. Thanks for reviewing!

Lyta PadfootReviewed Chapter: 17 on 2/21/2004
Ferdi can see again! You did a good job depicting the peculiar mix of chaos, hope and despair that seems to come upon those who wait for word of their loved ones in perilous situations. While Ferdi took the prize for romantic comments, Goldi's was very sweet.

Author Reply: Thank you. Ferdi is so very romantic about his Nell. Sometimes he makes *me* blush; it seems as if such moments when he's wearing his heart on his sleeve ought to be more private and not laid out in a story.

ConnieReviewed Chapter: 17 on 2/21/2004
You've done it again. I have tears in my eyes. I'm so happy for Ferdi. How did he get his sight back? Was it one of those tramatic things?

Poor Goldi and Farry. I'm glad she's being so detirmined. If Merry does marry them, she's going to have a whole lot of explaining to do to her new husband when he wakes up. I know he's going to wake up. He's too important to lose.

Keep it coming. I'm so hooked, I can't stop checking for updates.

Connie.

Author Reply: I'm not sure exactly how he got his sight back, nor are the healers, but it happened. If you research "shell shock" and WWI you'll find instances of traumatic blindness that sometimes resolves and sometimes doesn't (as comes out in Pippin's conversation with Elessar near the end of "Where the Merlin Sings").

She won't have any explaining to do... the wedding's been planned for months and Farry was just saying the other day how he wished they'd get it over with sooner than later...

Two more chapters on the outline (three, if you count the one I posted after this one, the wedding chapter which you've already read and reviewed, I think).

Thanks for the encouragement!

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