First and foremost, if you are joining us in-person for Mereth Aderthad 2025 and would like to join us for dinner on July 19 and breakfast on July 20, tomorrow is the last day to RSVP.

Mereth Aderthad is now less than a month away! If you've missed the last several months of these newsletters, we are gathering, both in-person and virtually, in honor of the SWG's twentieth birthday on July 19, with social events on either side of that event. We have twelve presenters sharing their research on various aspects of the legendarium with fanworks that respond to each presented alongside. The program and more on Mereth Aderthad can be found here, and you can register here.

As we approach the event, we've been interviewing presenters and creators about the work they will be sharing. We are bringing those interviews to a close, but this week, have conversations to share with two artists and a writer working on fanworks to accompany Mereth Aderthad presentations.

The featured artist for polutropos' "'Kidnap Fam' and the Living Legendarium," Tang Wen Xi creates artwork using vivid colors and a 3D style that often makes it seem that his landscapes and his warriors are pushing out of the page. Dawn spoke to him about his work; like many of our artists, he developed his unique style through studying tutorials (always comforting to those of us who are artists only in our dreams!) He also pushes beyond the Eurocentrism traditional to Tolkien fanart, depicting characters in dress and armor from cultures throughout the world. Tang Wen Xi finds this approach to be keeping with Tolkien's own work. "Haradrim and Easterlings are part of his worldbuilding," he said, "so it's apparent that he's not locked to the European side of Middle-earth."

You can read Dawn's interview with Tang Wen Xi here.

Anérea and Shadow are the featured artist and featured writer, respectively, for Zhie's "How To Make a Star From a Tree: The Science of Telperion and Laurelin," and they are both also interviewers for Mereth Aderthad. Therefore, it made sense that they interview each other about their fanworks for Zhie's upcoming presentation! There conversation spanned the various interpretations of light in Tolkien's world, the cartography of creating fanworks, and the challenges of pushing past imposter syndrome.

You can read and listen to Shadow and Anérea's conversation with each other here.

In other news, Anna (IdleLeaves) is generously continuing with monthly instadrabbling sesssions on the first Saturday of each month on the SWG Discord: July 5, August 2, and September 6 are the next three scheduled. Learn more about these instadrabbling sessions here and join the Discord here if you'd like to come create with us!

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. Registration is open!

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.”