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| All Work and No Play by Lindelea | 34 Review(s) |
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| demeter d | Reviewed Chapter: 26 on 12/29/2025 |
| OOOPS! I did a quick Wikipedia check. I am the one who is forgetting. I was hearing the voice of someone on the "Appendix Disks" reading a wartime letter from one of Tolkien's friends... and my remembery did not hear that right. He had said "my dear John RONALD"! The 'founder of our feast', after all. Your contribution to our virtual wake sounded lovely. I will see everyone again on New Years Eve. And Happy New Year to Everyone. Author 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...)! | |
| demeter d | Reviewed Chapter: 26 on 12/24/2025 |
| Now for this, also. It has been a decade and almost another year now since our friend Arthur "Fiondil" "left the Circles". So much life has happened in our shadowed old world since. I want to do something I have not done in some time. All of you friends of John Robert and Arthur; come with me again this Christmas Eve to "Our Cliff House". After your midnight services, after all of your own "Creatures" are settled, come with me. Bring your favorite virtual food and drinks, bring fragrant candles and music. Together we will pray for departed friends and loved ones. We can hope together for the renewing of peace in this troubled world. With the coming of dawn, we can remember the coming of the "Light of the World". Holiday Blessings to you all! Demeter D. Author 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. | |
| demeter d | Reviewed Chapter: 26 on 12/24/2025 |
| A blessed Christmas Eve to you and all of your readers! I am glad to see that you are still following your characters's journeys. In this story and others. You have not heard from me in some time because I have finally learned how to limit my screen time. Any more if I am on once a week it seems like a lot. I am glad to see that both Pippin's and Aragorn's desire for their friends to form connections is bearing fruit. Both Ferdi and Hal are seeing many layers in their new friends! Author 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! | |
| Larner | Reviewed Chapter: 15 on 12/18/2025 |
| You would have loved my mother, who adored puns. No, they are not going through what the Travellers went through, are they? But they are learning from the journey. Author 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.) | |
| Larner | Reviewed Chapter: 14 on 12/18/2025 |
| Ferdi's horizons are, after all, being broadened. Heh! Author 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.) | |
| Larner | Reviewed Chapter: 13 on 12/18/2025 |
| There is much to be said in praise of mountains. I've lived in sight of them since I was five years old, and I love them so! Author 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! | |
| Larner | Reviewed Chapter: 12 on 12/18/2025 |
| It appears to have been a particular gift of the Fallohides to first see what others did not see, and to then think outside the box as to how to respond to what they have seen. Their ability to analyze situations and find creative ways to respond to them made them accepted as leaders, but at the same time to arouse suspicions about them. "We love them for solving problems, but how does one understand them?" Sam's Gaffer might have been worried that his son was in danger of getting too caught up in his "betters'" ways, but it worked to the good for all of the Shire in the end. Author 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? | |
| Larner | Reviewed Chapter: 11 on 12/17/2025 |
| Ah, the blessings of magical thinking, which is too oft otherwise with the young adolescents of my acquaintance. Author Reply: 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!) | |
| Larner | Reviewed Chapter: 10 on 12/17/2025 |
| Those who are truly wise admit at least to themselves that there is far too much they don't know, and are always learning--or unlearning what they realize is not correct--to add to their wisdom and knowledge. Author 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! | |
| Fimbrethel | Reviewed Chapter: 25 on 11/27/2025 |
| "'Half-memorised?' Haldoron retorted. 'Are Tooks habitually given to understatement?'" "Ferdi let out a half-choked chuckle, followed by '...lots, and none at all...'" "Watch where you're walking, or walk where you're watching!" Lol! I liked all the last half of the chapter! (from Half-memorized on). Author Reply: I'm glad! Thanks so much for stopping to leave an encouraging word. | |