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| Sweet Woodbine by Bodkin | 14 Review(s) |
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| Alice | Reviewed Chapter: 5 on 5/1/2006 |
| Ooh, another chapter. I quite enjoyed this one. Poor Haldir indeed. It's not always a good thing for powerful people to take notice of you. Can I say that I really enjoyed his conversation with Calisse? I'd love to know the stories of noldor girls recruited by Galadriel. Yes, that was a shameless request. I'm greatly enjoying seeing more of Calamentur's wife here. It's good that someone in Elerrina's family is secretly for them. I'm also really enjoying seeing Elerrina as a craftswoman. It adds an interesting aspect to her character. Author Reply: Poor Haldir. He was rather expecting that helping organise the Galadhrim involved the woods - with maybe a bit of sabre-rattling. Calisse seems to get a lot of the irritating jobs here - hopefully, one day she will find herself doing something she enjoys. Galadriel is daughter to the Noldor High King - I'm sure she would have had a group of ellyth to attend her... And she would look for the more intelligent and open-minded - and perhaps those who are just a little bit different and on the outside of standard Noldor society. (You want to know their stories? As if this world wasn't getting complicated enough!) Nisimalote is growing as a character. There's a bit in Far Horizons I'm going to have to try to find - where Camentur says that she might look like a proper Noldor lady, but there's a lot beneath the surface. And she's young - and more romantic than Linevende. And less worried about upsetting Taryatur - after all, his injuries are well-buried and he hides them from his family all he can. I've spent a lot of time looking up stuff about glass-making and Venetian beads - google for images and you'll find a lot of the things I've been looking at. I liked her working at developing her craft - and fathoming how and when she would continue with it! Thank you. The story continues to complicate a bit - but they have 300 years before that ship bearing certain important elves arrives. No rush then! | |
| Lianna | Reviewed Chapter: 5 on 5/1/2006 |
| This is all so complex. Just like life. Different people react in different ways to seemingly similar experiences. It seems to me that your Legolas is far more scarred by the losses of people he loved than by the experience of war. In your very first chapter, when despair drove Legolas to thinking about something akin to suicide, it was not traumatic memories that brought him to that point, it was loneliness. I think that's very telling. I wish there were some way for Taryatur to find out that although Legolas is indeed troubled, it's not the kind of trouble he thinks it is. Perhaps someday you'll strand them in a cabin alone together during a three-day rainstorm or something. These two guys need to talk. Haldir trying to play the role of diplomat is hysterically funny. It's almost as though Gimli was trying to act like an Elf. Author Reply: You're right. Legolas has grown up in a world where hard experience teaches endurance. He relies on friends and family to provide continuity and misses familiar people - and has to deal not just with death in battle, but has had to face time. Taryatur left safety to fight at the Valar's call and was thrown into alien experiences before being suddenly transported back into the security of the Blessed Realm. I think the transition might have been too much for him - he needed longer to adjust and learn to live with his actions. I think Legolas and Taryatur will come to an understanding - some time. It's just not going to be easy for them. Taryatur has been burying his pain for over two ages: it is going to take some time for it to surface enough for him to be able to excise it. Haldir isn't really intended by nature to be a diplomat. But he is prepared to do it - if that's what needs doing. And Galadriel will provide all the instruction he needs! I think he'll hate it, though. Thank you - I only hope I can keep up with the increasing complexity! | |
| daw the minstrel | Reviewed Chapter: 5 on 5/1/2006 |
| So. Lots of threads here as various people try to sort out their futures and work toward them or even decide what they want them to be. I think I was most struck by Elerrina's mother's account of the change in her father after the experience of war. That was very sobering. I also liked Legolas's observation of how easy it is to stir up hatred and fear compared to creating harmony, how easy it is to destroy what others have labored long and hard to build. Author Reply: We've got 300 years to get through before the remaining characters arrive and things start to get sorted out - and there are threads heading in all directions! Elerrina's mother has no experience of life outside the Blessed Realm - I think that might make her respond to the world beyond purely through Taryatur's experience, and he was clearly more distressed than many others who were there. It is fascinating to wonder why some react so much more violently to horrible experiences - and I think he is extrapolating from himself to Legolas, while Legolas actually has completely different hang-ups. It is so true - and unfortunate - that moving anything forward is a matter of small cautious steps and constant reassurance, but that absolutely anything can set things back years. I sometimes wonder than anything positive actually manages to get done. At least in the Blessed Realm most people are trying to work together - but it won't stop a minority digging in their heels and fighting like dinosaurs to exclude anything that is different. | |
| Jay of Lasgalen | Reviewed Chapter: 5 on 5/1/2006 |
| Poor Legolas has to walk an increasingly difficult path between the various groups of elves. He can see both sides of an argument, but trying to explain to one side that the other has a point as well meets with the resistance one would expect. Linevinde (I can't do the dots!) has a similarly difficult task in explaining Taryatur's concerns to Elerrina. Although he has her interests at heart, he's just wrong - and although we know he gives in eventually, he never really changes his opinion :( Author Reply: Legolas has been landed with a very complicated role. And it seemed so straightforward at first glance! He's never really in the right place at the right time and he's constantly trying to soothe ruffled feathers. It's getting better in some ways - he is getting more good assistants - but, on the other hand, more people are starting to look to him for general support and specific aid. And in reality no-one is ever totally right - there are always buts and ifs. (It is possible to be totally wrong. Possible but unusual. Usually there are qualifications there, too.) But it is so hard to get someone to see the other side if they are determined not to acknowledge it. Linevende and Taryatur are serious and honest and they have a point - but it doesn't make them right either. But it does mean, I think, that their worries need to be taken into account. Love, romance and matrimony are terribly serious commitments among elves - there's no going for an annulment after the first couple of months because you find your parents were right. Better to proceed cautiously if you think there might be more to building your relationship than a desperate attraction. I suspect Taryatur will come to some accommodation with Legolas in the end. He's just not willing to remove the blinkers yet. But they have time - and lots of it. | |