1st May. Happy May Day!

ZeeDrippyVessel, author of The Empty Vessel, Tel' Lindar, Rider of the Mark and (most importantly ;-) the L/E story Use Me Once (all archived at Open Scrolls Archive), has asked me to draw your attention to Operation Gathering, 'a not-for-profit group assembled for the purposes of raising funds and interest in The Gathering of the Fellowship, and to support in particular the guests of honour invited to participate'.

The Gathering of the Fellowship, which will take place in Toronto, in July 2006, is a charity event that aims to promote adult literacy through a celebration of the works of JRR Tolkien. The funds raised by Operation Gathering go directly to The Gathering of the Fellowship.

You can read more about Operation Gathering by clicking on the link below. There are also links in the menu on the right and on the Contacts page.

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I've added part 18 of the Eowyn/Legolas challenge, The troublemaker, which is about Thorkell bogsveigir and includes an important clue…

Only 82 more parts left to write!

Eowynangel, btw, asked me if I was going to give the story a name. After much consideration ;-) since it takes place along the banks of the Anduin, and it's about getting home, I've decided to call it The water is wide.

(Sorry: if you have a dial-up connection or, worse still, a wireless connection like me, I don't think the music will work).

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Celticgoddessgirl asked whether it was possible to download my stories in a single file rather than chapter by chapter. This is already possible at Open Scrolls Archive: just scroll to the bottom of any chapter and click on the Download link. But I think it's a really good idea, so I'm going to add a downloadable text file to the title page of each of the main stories. (So far, I've only done My bow shall sing with your sword, because the editing—inserting asterisks to indicate italics—takes a long time! But, as a result, I've made a few corrections to Bow, especially in the punctuation department
:-( and I've added another extra scene, called Under the Blanket).

I've also taken the opportunity to polish that damned Yuletide Mystery—I knew that it was full of typos, and it was keeping me awake at night!

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Next up will be chapter 17 of Shadowland and another crossover—I'm quite excited about both of them.

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Finally, the MPAs are no longer accepting nominations.

There are 11 stories in the Naughty Category (and lots more in the others). The voting season begins on 15 May and, if all goes well, Legolas and Eowyn, probably accompanied by Gimli, will be attending the Awards Ceremony to present the Naughty Category Award to the lucky winner!

17th April. Shadowland chapter 16!

Remind me never to write such a complicated story again!

Luckily, Arador (all by himself) has had an idea that will save us a lot of time, so I can honestly say that the two strands are at last starting to come together and that the end is in sight. Not close, mind you. Just in sight.

I've also added another extra scene to Misrule in Mirkwood, entitled The First Time, which describes Legolas'… Well, you know. It's rather smutty, and has a short L/E postscript. (Do you think there is any significance to the fact that Legolas' first appears to look quite like Eowyn?)

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When I was making the bases for my 100 icons I came across some great pictures that, in the end, I didn't use.

First, Legolas the Orc Slayer:

Those eyes! Then Legolas bursting out of his jerkin:

Legolas in the rain:

You could almost mistake him for Orlando, couldn't you? Grumpy Legolas in a cuddly blue dressing gown:

And Legolas with a rather suggestive wine carafe—you can just imagine the misery Dominic & Billy would have put him through, can't you ;-)

Doesn't he look lovely, though? Are those pink bands holding back his hair?

I haven't finished with the icons, btw. I miss making them so much, I'm going to make some more :-D

11th April. No Shadowland quite yet, I'm afraid, but I've written another part for the Eowyn/Legolas challenge.

I had intended to get back to the main plot but, as usual, Legolas and Eowyn had other ideas ;-) This part is inspired by people who have remarked on the fact that Legolas is always—to quote Johnny Depp at the beginning of The Libertine—up for it.

I've finished the 100 icons challenge.

And… I've entered another challenge. I'm a challenge-aholic. But this one will be very long term, and it will be fun—100 crossovers!

I've cheated and posted The Enemy of my Enemy as my first story, but when I write the second one, I'll set up a proper page here.

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Two big, big thank yous to Eowynangel for making a printable cover for My bow shall sing with your sword, and to Celticgoddessgirl for making three lovely wallpapers! I don't think there's anything nicer than to have someone tell you they've been inspired by your stuff.

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Happy Easter! See you again soon.

2nd April. Well, I'm back from holiday... I'm still working on Shadowland, but I've made a few other updates.

I've added part 16 of the Eowyn/Legolas challenge, called Legolas. It rounds off the Beginnings—Middles—Ends, Theodred—Faramir—Legolas sequence inspired by Belle, but the next part will get back to Thorkell bogsveigir and the story…

Whilst in Canada I saw a Canadian film called Beowulf and Grendel (twice ;-) It begins with a lovely scene in which the child Grendel is gamboling along beside his father, laughing and turning cartwheels. For some reason it reminded me of Little Legolas and Thranduil. So I've added another extra scene to Chapter 3 of Misrule in Mirkwood, in which Little Legolas learns about death, mortality and… well, something about sex.

Finally, I've made thirty more Legolas/Eowyn icons—I think they're getting better ;-) Only 25 more to go.

14th March. Today (or yesterday—I'm not exactly sure) is Eryn Carantaur's first birthday!

To celebrate, I've written an angsty short story, called Happy Anniversary, in which Eowyn breaks some sad news to Legolas and Legolas (possibly) gives away the plot to a future story.

I've also entered another Live Journal challenge, called _lotr100, which involves making 100 icons, thirty of which must be based on themes supplied. There are more details (and some absolutely amazing icons) here:

I've posted mine here, too. I'm hoping that I'll be inspired by everyone else, and improve with practice!

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I'm going on holiday on Saturday, to Vancouver :-) for two weeks, so there will be no more updates until after I get back, but I'm planning to do some writing while I'm away. Shadowland is top priority!

19th February. I've added part 15 of the Eowyn/Legolas challenge, which is called Faramir.

Like the last part, it's a response to Belle's request to see Eowyn with her previous lovers. I have to admit that, when I saw the picture of Faramir in the banner, my heart faltered a bit—he looks so lovely! But I've always tried to make Faramir sympathetic, just wrong for Eowyn, and I hope he's that in this story. There's a bit of Leggy/Eowyn angst in there, too.

I've also added my

essay, though, since its purpose is to introduce readers to this pairing, there isn't much in it that's new—except, perhaps, the character studies.

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Finally, in a moment of complete insanity, I volunteered to help with the My Precious Awards (MPA). I am looking after the Naughty Category ;-) At the moment, we are still looking for nominations—so, if you know of a story you think deserves an award, please nominate it!

This year's categories are:

Warm and Fuzzy
Slash
Het
Elves
Ficlet
Multipart
Humour
Newcomer
Known Author
General
Drama/Angst
Naughty
MIA (Missing in Action)

To nominate, just go to the library website (see the link to the right), scroll down to the category you want, click on the Nominate link and and send an email containing the following information:

Category:
Story name:
Story Rating:
Working story link:
Author name:
Author working e-mail:
Whether you want to be named or anonymous:
Your e-mail address and internet name:

If you're not sure which category a particular story would fit best, don't worry, choose one, send in the nomination, and the admins will move it (with the author's consent) if they think it will do better elsewhere. And if you prefer to nominate anonymously, just say so in your email.

13th February. I thought it would be fun to write a little Valentine's Day drabble, with a tiny epilogue…

(I've also fixed the links on the Fan Fiction page).

9th February. Shadowland chapter 15! Yes!

I hope you like it. I realise you'd probably prefer to find out what happens between Haldir and Shadow Eowyn, but that's in the next chapter, which I'll start as soon as I've finished the next Eowyn/Legolas challenge story, called Faramir :-)

In the meantime, we're back with Wilawen and the boys, and things have definitely gone from bad to worse. (If you've read the War of the Spider Queen series you may recognise the drow—and be able to guess why he wants Wilawen…)

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I'm writing an 'essay' for the

—about Legolas & Eowyn, naturally, which I will also post here—and, checking out the links on the Fan Fiction page, I've found that both Warrior's Glory and The Path Not Taken seem to have disappeared. As a result, the links to stories archived on those sites are broken. I've managed to find alternative copies of most of them (and I'll update the links asap), but the two I cannot find are:

In the Blue of the Night by Holly Golightly

Temperature by Moonwhip

If anyone can tell me where to find them, I'd be very grateful.

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Do you like my 'arty' pictures? Pity Legolas has come out a bit striped.

26th January. I don't know why I bother to make plans because I never stick to them!—you may have noticed that I posted the second part of The enemy of my enemy and two more Eowyn/Legolas challenge stories last week.

Today I've added the fourteenth challenge story, Theodred. The plot was inspired by Belle, who pointed out that, although we've seen Legolas with several of his earlier lovers, we've never seen Eowyn with Theodred or Faramir. So this part has been written at her request!

I've also taken part in another challenge, called 1sentence. There are more details on the page, but the result is fifty tiny one-sentence drabbles about Legolas and Eowyn. It took a surprisingly long time and I had trouble with a few of the themes—potatoes, chocolate, telephone, supernova! And I've cheated a bit with some of the others, by adapting passages from the existing stories, but they seemed to fit so well I couldn't think of anything else. See what you think.

I've made a new banner for the front page, which I'm intending to change every so often.

And, finally, I came across this interesting full-length picture of Haldir the other day—I don't remember ever having seen his legs before ;-) I think it looks like a scene from Shadowland—which would make the elf at the left one of the craftsman-builders, perhaps Annael, and the pair to the right members of the Eryn Carantaur Border Guards.

(Speaking of Shadowland… I seem to have been suffering from some sort of phobia, but I think it's passing, and Cuthalion has particularly requested the next chapter (thank you) so keep your fingers crossed for me).

5th January 2006. Apologies for having disappeared for a while. I crashed my car into a gatepost just after Christmas (sliding on ice) and, although I wasn't hurt at all, I've spent the last week marooned three miles from the nearest bus stop, haggling on the phone with my insurance company and with the people they've employed to collect and repair it...

I needed a bit of a break, so I've written another crossover, a short story called The enemy of my enemy. The crossover is a fandom I know very little about aside from finding this particular character intriguing. See what you think. (I've assumed that they can speak a common language because we've already done sign language, with Wilawen & Drizzt ;-) There will eventually be a second part that tells the incident from his point of view. But not until after I've written the next installment of the challenge, and chapter 15 of Shadowland.

Since Christmas is over :-( I've put the old banner back on the front page, and put the Yuletide Mystery in the Drabbles section, but there are still links to the rest of the Yuletide Calendar in the story.

Finally, eowynangel has sent me a lovely wallpaper inspired by chapter 14 of Shadowland and part 2 of the Yuletide Mystery. She says, "As for the quote, it's a reference to Aragorn's answer to Eowyn in RotK. It's also a reference to Haldir's love for the real Eowyn that cannot be returned." I've called the wallpaper

28th December. Yesterday I received an email from Arwenevenstar's sister, saying that Arwen died at Christmas.

Arwen was so enthusiastic, so full of life, always taking the trouble to tell me when she had enjoyed a chapter and was looking forward to the next. She loved Orlando Bloom, and elves, and she liked her fiction NC-17. She made wonderful avatars and banners and wallpapers especially for Eryn Carantaur (see below) and she had just started writing. As her sister said, 'her passions were reading fan fiction, making graphics and working hard.'

I never met her, and only corresponded with her for a short time, but I will miss her very much. I can't begin to imagine how much her family and friends will miss her.

23rd December. Well it was a close thing, but I've finished it!

I hope you enjoyed the calendar, especially the glimpse of the future. What happened between Haldir and Shadow Eowyn? We'll be finding out quite soon. How did Thranduil come to be involved with Cyllien? That will be one of the main strands of the next story. Who is the wise woman and what will happen between her and Haldir? I'm afraid that will take a bit longer to unfold…

I'm sure you've noticed that I've not been doing much updating recently. (Next time I decide to do something for Christmas, I must plan well in advance :-) I do have the next part of the challenge under way, so I should be posting that soon after Christmas, and then I'll get back to work on Shadowland.

In the meantime, Season's Greetings! I hope you have a very happy holiday.

10th December. Just a small update.

I've added part 10 of the Eowyn/Legolas challenge—judging by Eowyn's final words, the next part may well be smut—and the first part of the Yuletide Mystery (for tomorrow, because it's my birthday!). The Mystery will be in three parts and I'll aim to post the final part for Christmas Eve.

BTW, I haven't forgotten Shadowland and I will be getting back to it soon :-)

6th December. Well, it's a bit late, but I thought it would be fun to have an 'advent' calendar :-) The doors will contain drabbles, puzzles ('adapted' from well-known ones), riddles, pictures (some of which will be spoilers) and a Yuletide Mystery in several parts. Fingers crossed, I'll update it each evening (UK time) with the next day's item.

I had intended to leave the Eowyn/Legolas for a while but, as usual things didn't go to plan, so I added part 9 last week. I hope you like the plot development ;-)

At the same time, I also added another lovely wallpaper by eowynangel (which illustrates the final chapter of To the Sea…) and some exciting banners by arwenevenstar, including a particularly nice one, I think, of Haldir.

25th November. I've added part 8 of the Eowyn/Legolas challenge, Dawn, in which we see how Eowyn fares in single combat with Thorkell bogsveigir. (Well, we can make an educated guess, can't we?)

It's a good place to pause for a while, whilst I get on with the next part of Shadowland and a little something for Christmas...