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A Small and Passing Thing  by Lindelea 4 Review(s)
LarnerReviewed Chapter: 45 on 4/23/2023
Well, now that the spell has been revealed it can no longer harm. I think Frodo needs to visit Budgeford and where the other rebels dwell, and use the jewel on them all. Many will be in better straits soon.

AntaneReviewed Chapter: 45 on 3/8/2009
I hope this is the beginning of the end of Freddy's troubles. Saruman tried so hard, but you can't stop love or virtue of Elvish gems.

Namarie, God bless, Antane :)

FantasyFanReviewed Chapter: 45 on 10/22/2003
I totally forgot to comment about Frodo's daydreams of a wife and children. You are continuing that theme, and I like it. Slowly the hope for a future is returning, and Frodo can let himself imagine a long life. But it's March, and bad times are coming. I suppose it's the shock of his illness that burns the hope out of him. I'm looking forward to reading your inerpretation.

Author Reply: You're so right. It is with the March 13 attack, within the safety of the shire, that Frodo begins to realise that he can never go back to the way things were. (The previous attack, on October 6, was still well outside the borders, and I can almost see him rationalising that inside the Shire he'd be safe from such things.)

FantasyFanReviewed Chapter: 45 on 10/22/2003
A visit of a whole week with Lobelia! Even I have trouble thinking of what they could have talked about for that long! And, it seems that it was too long of a visit, for Freddy's concerns. It's kind of satisfying to think nobody is as good as Frodo in taking care of Freddy and helping him through the dark times. He comes back and takes over, figuring what's best for Stella as well as Freddy. Especially after deliberately inviting the darkness in recalling the Wizard's curse to concious mind, it's good that Arwen's jewel has bright magic to counter the dark. It seems to me that Frodo puts a bit of his own strength into the mix also, as the jewel brightens when he hold it with Freddy, as it does not do when Lobelia held it alone, or when Frodo fingers it for support. Watching the effect on Freddy of holding the jewel for just a moment makes me wonder just how much of its power is sustaining Frodo, who wears it all the time, and how little of him is really left.

Author Reply: "how little of him is really left" how chilling, and insightful. I hadn't exactly looked at it that way.

It always jarred me, how matter of factly everything was wrapped up, without a hint of Frodo's decline, well, maybe a hint, his illnesses on March 13 and October 6. However, the next March 13 he was able to conceal his illness (with difficulty) from Sam, so I have the impression, whenever I re-read "The Grey Havens", that he's getting better! But then out of the blue, apparently, he leaves...

That is one of the reasons why, in this story, I try to explain his departure to my own satisfaction, and in the bargain explain the brevity of the record in "The Grey Havens" (between the beginning of March, when he lost the manuscript behind the books on the bookshelf, and September when he left, he had to write that last chapter out again, and he was declining rapidly and had to be more concise in order to finish before he ran out of time--something to that effect).

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