Comments on Looking at the Stars and Counting the Hours

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I liked this a lot! Through dialogue and description you created two very real, complex, idiosycratic characters. I've read a fair amount of Maedhros/Fingon but you kept surprising me. Beautiful, sad, and romantic.

As for constructive criticism, I thought the first section would have been even stronger if there had been less exposition and more portrayal of individual events. Which is my fancy way of saying "show not tell," even though you tell so beautifully. :)

Also, make sure to start a new paragraph each time a new character speaks. (Forgive me if I begin to sound like an annoying writing professor....)



Thank you very much! I had already considered the question whether there was too much exposition in  the first section. For me, the amount of exposition is connected with the fact that I decided to keep that section as a recounted memory or flashback - although starting with a long flashback is also usually not recommended. Too much "showing" in the first section, might make the switch to the present at the beginning of the second section work less well (if, in fact, it does). I am not quite ready to revise that decision yet, but if I do, I will certainly add more detail. I'm very glad that I managed to keep you interested enough to keep on reading past the first section anyway!

The rule about a new paragraph per speech doesn't obtain in the same way in the tradition I was taught to write in, but you're quite right that it would work better on this site. If I manage to find the time, I'll make the adjustment.

Wonderful character study of Maedhros. There are many parts to remember but the one that struck me as a great summary is your description of how he had become a tough lord in a distant fortress but people could find Valinor in his gestures. He didn't need to build anything to relive Tirion, he just was. It says a lot about him in few words.

I liked the ortiginal title very much too.



I really enjoyed this. I love the characterization. I have to tell you that you are not kicking in an open door with me. I am hard to win over on an interpretation of Fingon and Maedhros. They are my favorite couple to write and I am very partial to my own interpretation, but I love yours!

Unlike Maedhros, I'm not known for my diplomacy; for a moment I actually considered dashing after him and dragging him off his horse

This is so completely the Findekáno of canon texts for me. His impetuousness. His impulse to action.

I thought that all I needed to do was to convey to him that I couldn't care less that the customs of the Eldar don't envision love between males or between cousins. I imagined that as soon as I gave my explicit consent to the affair, he would take over as usual, my cousin Nelyafinwë. Instead of which I find I've literally swept him off his feet.

I find this very believable also. I believe Findekáno's expectation of how he thought it would go with them and I believe entirely in what happens instead.

The mere sight of his savaged flesh wiped all accounts and all thought of accounting. That anyone, even Morgoth, could do such a thing to one of us, to one of our family, to our Russandol, was a horror that immediately demonstrated to us the limits of our imagination. Despite everything, we are a close-knit family, after all.

Once again your account is absolutely convincing for me. Especially the last line. I have thought about it a lot, both for my fiction and my non-fiction accounts of the House of Finwë.

the honed reflexes of Nelyafinwë, sometime courtier and politician in Tirion, kicking in-or perhaps, deep down, the instincts of Nelyo, brilliant son of an over-exacting father?

I very much see Maedhros in this way. Convincing again!

My brother Turukáno wrote to me that he would rebuild Tirion in the valley of Tumladen, wherever that may be. Maedhros doesn't need stone and mortar to make you see Tirion; he sketches it in, casually, with a gesture of his hand.

This is just perfect. Nelyafinwë the first in so many ways of the Princes of the Noldor of his generation would have to be like this in my imagination.

A dark head interposes itself between me and Russandol. ‘Guard your eyes, Sire', advises Maglor softly. I open my mouth to make a cutting remark; then I realize he is right. I really will need to work on my discretion, 

I love Macalaurë in this segment. Again, I concur with your creation of the character. Again the characterization of Findekáno is exactly on point for me here also.

I think the ending was perfect. The devastation of the loss of Fingon! And yet you give them the happy ending (bittersweet as it is)!

I usually would not ask this in a comment on another writer's story (not a place I would generally be comfortable in pimping my own--this is about your story afterall!), but I wonder if you have read any of my Maitimo/Findekáno stories on this site? I ask because I think our insight into the characters has a lot in common. I also would love it if you would read my biography of Fingon here in the reference section.

Looking forward to reading the rest of your stories.



Oh wow! Thank you! Praise from you means a lot to me, as I've enjoyed your own stories about Maitimo and Findekano so much. I've made some rather different decisions about plot here, of course (influenced, I think, by Ford of Bruinen), so that these two have a different back story. But your version of Findekano is definitely one of those I have in mind, when I think about him as a character. I think my version of Findekano is perhaps a bit less resilient, a bit more fragile (considering, for example, the way the story begins)?

I think I had a brief look at your biography at a point when I was already going cross-eyed from too much reading on the screen. Must have another look!

Need to respond to your response! Thank you so much! I think your differences in plot really work and fit with canon as I read it. I can handle backstory differences and even things like that your "version of Findekano is perhaps a bit less resilient, a bit more fragile." What I can't handle is reading characters I love and thinking: did this writer read the same book as me??! Shy, retiring Fingon afraid of his own ghost! Or mad as a hatter Maedhros accomplishing what he did in terms of alliances, diplomacy and military strategy make me tear my hair out. I found your characterization balanced and, as I said, convincing. 

They were rulers, all of them, except Aredhel and Galadriel (at this point), and they had to build up their realms from scratch in an unfamiliar country. Also, my impression at least is that the Noldor they ruled had to some extent chosen to be ruled by them, since they could have otherwise moved to another realm. All that would place severe constraints on how retiring, shy or mad any of them could afford to be.

I have never really been into the whole love affair angle between Maedhros and Fingon, although I am certainly aware of its presence across the spectrum of Tolkien fandom via writing and artwork.  Usually it is something that I pass by impassively, though I hope not prudishly; indeed yours is the first work of this kind that I have taken the time to read properly, this I have done partially in token for your kind reviews of my own work.

First of all I would like to add my voice to the comments made by previous reviewers regarding your handling of character and internal dialogue.  I found the regular allusion to events in 'The Book' most helpful in rooting down the protaganists as this reader knows them; they are most definitely there in your words, living and breathing and feeling.

I don't know if there is a term for Tolkien fans who came into the author's world via the Peter Jackson films: if there is then I'm afraid that is what I am, but I do not feel that it is anything to be ashamed of.  What I am trying to say is that I read the characters as players (imagining certain actor types for each role) whereas I interpret your view of them quite differently, very much deeper than my own.   

That said, I particularly enjoyed your rendering of the discourse between Fingon and Maglor and the new understanding between them; included in this is Maglor's wariness should his brothers ever find them out.  You know your stuff and you convey it very well, clear and unambigious; I would even say that you have Tolkien's heart of Melancholy, I on the other hand have seen too many films...

Very well done indeed!



There are a lot of Tolkien fans who came into his world via the films, and it is certainly nothing to be apologetic about, especially not for somebody like you who has clearly read the books very thoroughly since!

You are quite right that I'm not one of them. I was a Tolkien fan before the films came out and had already read Tolkien fan fiction as well. So I experienced the films more like a particularly successful kind of fan fiction.

Thank you very much for your kind comments about my handling of character and dialogue! I do tend to concentrate on that and sometimes allow allusions to the Book to stand in for more conventional plotting. I think this may be part of you mean when you talk about our different approaches.

I'm also flattered that you should think I have Tolkien's heart of melancholy. I suspect the Professor would not have agreed, but I also think he may not always have been comfortable with his own melancholy.

I really appreciate your taking the trouble to read and review!