Hands Wide Open for talullahred by ladyelleth

[ladyelleth]

Author name: Elleth
Recipient's name: talullahred
Title: Hands Wide Open
Rating: PG
Request: Set in Eglarest, naturally with seascapes, preferably wintery, but it's up to you. We get a glimpse at the daily life of the city. Something gets lost.
Author's notes: My recipient may recognize a joke and a minor element in this fic. Consider it an homage to some

Comments

[dreamflower02]

I love all these glimpses of young Gil-galad and his mischief! And I also like your world-building, examining parts of M-e that we never get to see. The idea of the Easterlings having a sort of Mongolian culture makes sense.

[ladyelleth]

Thank you so much! I'm glad you enjoyed Gil-galad as well as the worldbuilding; I was bitten by the worldbuilding bug a while ago and adore exploring the lesser-known corners of Middle-earth, and I'm always happy when others enjoy coming along for the ride. :)

[talullahred]

Hi!

This is wonderful!!! I love it so much!

By pure coincidence, I've recently watched Marco Polo and did a lot of reading on Mongolian customs and women and so I was really happy that Ayulan was more than just a wife (and the horse riding reference... yay! :)). Her daughter kicking GG's butt was also awesome. :) Poor lass... kids do get into an awful lot of trouble. But I loved the glimpse of future, responsible, honorable GG who wouldn't let her take the fall alone.

I loved, loved, loved the unexpectedness of these visitors. In a million years I wouldn't have thought of Easterlings for this setting. Well done!

Apart from the inventiveness of the fic and the lovely details, your writing really is wonderful, with beautifully use of words to create a scene.

Thank you so much for this wonderful gift!

[ladyelleth]

Thank you so, so much for such a glowing review! (And can I say now how happy I was to see you review my LotR SeSa fic as well? It's always a challenge - in a good way - to write for someone I didn't know, but knowing one of my fics wasn't a complete miss was a big relief

[talullahred]

:) Thank you.

[rhapsody11]

I just love when you write these first age tribes, I already loved your Haleth story last year and the way you write these strong women of the easterling tribe is again outstanding. :) Then there is also of course this awesome gapfiller explanation what happened to the tribe of men that remained loyal to the house of Fëanor. To think that they too have been made thralls in Hitlum...

Wonderfully done!

[ladyelleth]

Thank you so much, Rhapsy! ♥ You were one of the big influences in getting me to write outside the box when it came to exploring underdeveloped cultures, and if not for you I probably would have played it much safer here instead of working with the Easterlings, even though it always bothered me how they disappeared from the narrative after the Nirnaeth Arnoediad.

I'm glad you enjoyed this! :)

[ladyelleth]

Thank you so much! They were fun to explore; I'm very happy you had fun reading them as well. :)

[kayleelupin]

Oooh, Mongolian-type Easterlings! How interesting! I really like them, and I want to know more about them. :)

Ereinion's crown being lost made me giggle. Poor young Ereinion.

Kaylee Arafinwiel

[ladyelleth]

Thank you very much! I hope to explore Ayulan and her people a lot more eventually, too. :)