Happy New Year, everyone!

Normally, we release new challenges on the 15th of the month. At the start of the year, we mess up our own system and things get kind of weird.

January is always an amnesty month, when you can complete any challenges you missed from the previous year and receive the stamps for them. This year, because it is our twentieth and Grundy (who maintains the stamp collections) is generous, it is not just an amnesty month but a Jubilee! This means you get another crack at any challenge and can collect just about any stamp for it. (The few exceptions are listed in the challenge itself.) Was a challenge before your time? Or you just didn't get to a challenge you that thought sounded fun? Or you started a challenge fanwork and never finished it? Do it now and get the stamp!

Because it would be kind of a bummer to start the amnesty challenge, especially a Jubilee, two weeks into the new year, we start it on January 1, but it still runs until February 15, so you have a month-and-a-half for this one.

We will also be instadrabbling on January 18 and 19 on our Discord server. Instadrabbling is a long-running Tolkien fandom tradition (older than we are!) where we create and share fanworks together in chat. Prompts for this instadrabble weekend are open-ended, but the mods promise to toss out some challenge prompts for Jubilee so that we can fill those stamp collections! And while we love drabbles, any fanwork you want to create during the session is welcome, as long as it is Tolkien-related. You can find more details on the upcoming instadrabbling sessions here. All are welcome, whether you're an instadrabbling veteran, a first-timer, or just want to read and see the fanworks as they come in!

But today (Saturday), we will be hosting our first session on "So You Want to Present at a Tolkien Conference?" on writing the proposal. The session will be hosted via Zoom and all are welcome to attend and participate however you're most comfortable! (Want to lurk? Ask a ton of questions? We want you all here!) The session will be recorded and available afterward, but if you can make it live, it starts at 1:00 PM Eastern Time (find that in your timezone). You can join the session here.

We hope at least some of you will turn what you learn into a Mereth Aderthad proposal but, really, we think Tolkien fanworks people have brilliant ideas and want to do our small part to help and encourage those ideas to be shared. We hope to see you there!

SWG News

New Challenge: Epic 80s
This month's challenge features hundreds of fresh prompts from the bodacious decade of the 1980s.

Cultus Dispatches: Communities Do Comment
Comment data from the SWG underscores community as an essential component to a robust commenting culture.

Instadrabbling Sessions for July, August, and September
Instadrabbling continues on the first Saturday of each month on our Discord server.

The Silmarillion Writers' Guild Presents Mereth Aderthad 2025 - July 19, 2025, Burlington, VT and online - A celebration of creativity and scholarship inspired by the works of J.R.R. Tolkien

New Fanworks

Is it raining with you? by AdmirableMonster [Writing]

In the last days of Númenor, two very different men meet in Umbar and fall in love.

(Please note that while this work is heavily inspired by Disco Elysium, no knowledge of the game is necessary to read the fic!)

Read more ...

Wrensong and Roses by Isilme_among_the_stars [Writing]

Concerned by his responses to the paraphernalia of healing, Fingon steals Maedhros from his room for an impromptu garden excursion. Maedhros battles with dark thoughts.

Read more ...

Bon(e)fire by Fuin [Writing]

On the night before the battle, Caranthir and his ally share thoughts about their peoples' traditions:

Burning bones ward off evil.

Read more ...

McShady by Babblecat [Writing]

Melkor has himself a bad time in the Void. 

 

Read more ...

Updated Fanworks

A Thousand Winds that Blow by StarSpray [Writing]

When uneasy dreams bring him back into Beleriand, Daeron finds a pair of twins who have lost their home, and an enemy who has lost himself. The Shadow's reach is growing ever longer, and if they are to survive, they must do it together.

Read more ...

Nasyalossë by Lovimmy3365 [Writing]

Erestor lay up against a tree, brown washed to black in the wet of the snow. The black disc of the new moon sailed across the dark sky. Erestor wished it were gone. He had no need to look into dark eyes any longer.

He was dying.

(AKA Erestor unwittingly travels back in time to the days between the Dagor Bragollach and the Nirnaeth Arnoediad, meets the sons of Feanor, Thingol and his ilk, many Laiquendi, many Dwarves, and Men besides, and THEN decides to solve the drowning of Beleriand himself. This has nothing to do with his personal problems. Nope. Not at all. Erestor is having regular feelings.)

Read more ...

Until the Stars are All Alight by Dagstjarna [Writing]

Reembodied in Aman, Celebrimbor decides to return to Middle earth to help heal the darkness and hurt wrought by the ring. 

Read more ...

From That Rubble by StarSpray [Writing]

Fëanor shrugged, studying the contents of his wine glass. “Something must be done about that house. It will fall down eventually.”
“It does not follow that it must be you that tears it down single-handedly. Are you sure you do not want help?”
“It’s not as though I have much else to do. I need to build something new there,” he said after a few moments. “To do that, I must first clear away the old and broken things.”

Decades out of Mandos, too many things in Fëanor's life remain broken. He can't do anything except wait for his sons to come to him, but he can do something about the old and crumbling house where they once lived. 

Read more ...

The Mirror Crack'd by AdmirableMonster [Writing]

Rescued from a brutal Angband hunt, an ex-thrall with a strange and powerful artifact embedded in his spine is brought to Himring, for it is one of the only places in Beleriand which welcomes such folk. Though he has no memories of his life before, Anniavas slowly becomes accustomed to his new life and finds he has a queer connection with Maedhros, Himring's lord. As their intimacy grows, however, so do the dangers surrounding them, both without and within. What secrets are hidden inside the depths of Anniavas's lost memories--and how will those with whom he is forging and deepening bonds react, when those secrets are at last revealed?

Read more ...

Eä's Redemption by AaronAzrael [Writing]

This is my new poetical attempt to add my own interpretation to Tolkien's Cosmology as to Eru's Creation and the Valar's minds and behind-the-scene providence reasons and mechanisms.. I often review Eä as part of our own world, just in another dimension, this is why I have always seriously thought on the matter who the Ainur are, who Eru is, how he matches our own religious pantheon, and this has been conducted after serious research of many esoteric teachings of our own planet's heritage.

Read more ...

Around the World and Web

Scribbles and Drabbles 2026
Scribbles & Drabbles is a fic and art exchange with a minimum word count of 100 words.

Tolkien Disability Pride 2026
This Tumblr event focuses on ALL creative works focusing on disability in Tolkien's universe.

Tolkien Gen Week 2026
Tolkien Gen Week will run from July 6-12, 2026 to appreciate all of the incredible characters and relationships within Tolkien’s legendarium that fall under the broad category of “gen.”