Comments on Closing the Circle

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I've enjoyed this series greatly. You've taken a subject and a character that tends to get cliched treatment in stories and really brought it to life in a new way. Miriel is dark and mysterious and quite unlike any Miriel that I have ever read before. The brief appearances of Finwe, Indis, and Feanaro as they live serve as bitter reminders throughout of what Miriel has set in motion with her choice.

Yet even if she is a dark character, I find myself with empathy for Miriel. When she talks about surmounting any obstacle to save Feanaro ... that is heart-rending. Your Miriel is complex and intriguing (and if we're being honest, making me want to pick up one of my WiPs and write! :^D)

Thanks for sharing this series! :)

Thanks for the review! I have a bit of an obsession with dark Míriels -though I have to admit that the one in Númenor is even darker. ;) I mostly tolerate clichés, but when you start to see recurring patterns (like: every Elf-woman in Tolkien must be perfectly boring and uninteresting, or either grow boring and uninteresting through sucessive revisions to the original idea), I get a bit aggressive and start writing things like this. ;)

Oh, and if I really have inspired you to continue an unfinished fic, then I can consider my story leisurely sucessful.

Gadira (who will grow used one day to sign with this name)

ps: BTW, this is a bit unrelated, but it came to my mind while I thought about your Finarfin essay. Back in 2002-2003, there were loads of good Silmarillion fanfic written. (Among them, yes, there were even some Finarfin stories!) I´ve thought that maybe, if I had a way to post recommendation links, at least some of them might be of interest for people in this group. Just a thought...