west of the moon, east of the sun

The Snowflake Challenge is nearly upon us again and I just remembered that I actually did set some goals last year. How did I do? Well...

- I have a bunch of books that I own but have not read--I want to read at least some of them.

I don't think I even touched the books I own but haven't read. Instead I reread a bunch of old favorites, and I regret nothing.

- I want to finish Where the Ocean Meets the Sky and the Land.

Ahahahaaaaaaa, I may have updated it once.

- My Goodreads reading goal is set at 100 books.

I'm at 86 which honestly is not bad, all things considered.

.

I'm not at all beating myself up over not meeting any goals because, well. *gestures at 2020*

Challenge #10: In your own space, talk About A Creator/Someone Who Inspired You. 

I guess the idea behind this question is to name someone actually In Fandom, but you know what? I'm going to talk about Christopher Tolkien. He died just last week at 95, and if he was not his father's absolute Biggest Fan I do not know who was. He grew up immersed in Middle-earth, drew the first maps for The Lord of the Rings, and then spent his entire adult life dedicated to organizing and publishing not just The Silmarillion but all of those drafts and notes, along with commentary, so the rest of the world could see and understand and appreciate his father's imagination. The Tolkien fandom would not be what it is without his work, on both fannish and scholarly sides, and it was so clearly a labor of love (and given his dad's handwriting it was definitely at times labor). I hope that he knew how much all his work meant to so many people all around the world.

Challenge #11: In your own space, recommend a fannish or creative resource.

I tend to forget that it's there so here's a reminder to myself as well as everyone else: The SWG has a reference library with character bios and resources on everything else from fan culture to language to Germanic and world history and myth.

Challenge #7: Promote/Rec/Sing the Praises* of Yourself!

Well my AO3 is here, and my SWG is here.

A handful of particular stories I'm really proud of are:

Fields and Mountains Ever Blessed - Celebrían has not been idle while waiting for Elrond to come west.

On Wings of Storm - When the dragons come, so does Vingilot--and Earendil is not alone on board.

Silver Fragments Falling - When Finrod had previously considered his death, he had thought it would come in battle, at the end of a sword or a mace or an arrow.

Like a Shooting Star - Gil-galad in Mordor

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Challenge #8: Rec at least three fanworks that you didn’t create.

An Untold Tale by Kaz (Tolkien) - Injured, afraid, and freezing in the forests of Doriath, Elurín manages to tap into an inheritance from Melian he never realised was there. In his desperation, he uses it, and he and his brother vanish from history.
Three thousand years later, a patrol of Imladris finds two strange boys in the woods.

Walking the Starlit Road by Independence1776 (Tolkien) - After creating the musical The Saga of the Rings with his nephew, Maglor struggles to find his place in a greatly changed Aman.

Our Lady of Perpetual Compassion, She of Sorrows and Succor (Tolkien) by HerenorThereNearnorFar - "Few stories were told of Nienna, not because she was not loved, but because she was loved too much. Those elves who dwelled in Valinor knew her sorrows and did not pry at them. Her part in the stories of others was glossed over, her name whispered gently, her tale left unspoken and unrecorded. Such was the respect given to her, for all people might need pity some day.
If an exile from over the sea needed to learn, or a new child asked, they were shared only snippets of thought, memories, echoes of what was told perhaps only once long ago.
These were the things that were not said."

how big the hourglass, how deep the sand by Handful_of_Silence (Good Omens) - After the Apocalypse, and with characteristic slowness, both Crowley and Aziraphale think there might be something they need to sit down and talk about.
And then Aziraphale disappears.


bound to find a trace by rosepetalfall (Star Wars) - Luke wakes up and he’s at home. It is hot and dry and the walls are white. There is the faint hum of vaporators outside.

Challenge #4: In your own space, set some goals for the coming year. They can be fannish or not, public or private.

- I have a bunch of books that I own but have not read--I want to read at least some of them.

- I want to finish Where the Ocean Meets the Sky and the Land.

- My Goodreads reading goal is set at 100 books.

Late to the party because I couldn't decide if I wanted to do it at all, but it turns out I do so here's the first part of playing catch-up.

Challenge #1: In your own space, introduce yourself!

( Read more... )


Challenge #2: In your own space, talk about your fannish history.
( Read more... )

Day 5: In your own space, promote three communities, challenges, blogs, pages, Twitters, Tumblrs or platforms and explain why you love them.

The Silmarillion Writer's Guild is a great community and easily the friendliest in the Tolkien fandom I have ever encountered. I'm linking to the main site but they have a Dreamwidth community and feed, as well as a Tumblr and a Discord server. There are monthly challenges that are always really creative and fun.

Legendarium Ladies April is a yearly event that runs on Tumblr to celebrate the ladies in Tolkien's legendarium. The mods are lovely and the prompts are always wonderful, and there's always a lot of great fanwork that gets produced for the event.

b2mem is another yearly Tolkien event that also always has great prompts and a lot of terrific fanworks made for those prompts, and it's just a whole lot of fun.


Day 6: In your own space, create a list of at least three fannish things you'd love to receive, something you've wanted but were afraid to ask for - a fannish wish-list of sorts.

I mean, every author would like illustrations of their fic, right? Any fic. It would probably kill me and my cause of death would be Sheer Delight.

Anything from any exchange letter I've written. Especially Innumerable Stars.

If there is fic out there about Belladonna having adventures with her sisters, then it is deeply buried and I don't know how to find it on AO3 because all the fics out there with Belladonna listed as a character are Bilbo/Thorin fics, as far as I can tell, and it is very frustrating. So I guess this one is either more Belladonna adventure fic or recs for existing Belladonna adventure fic?