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Fanfiction (LOTR)
Ongoing
20 chapters

Where to begin with this book of my heart?

I picked it up in February of 2017, or maybe it was late January. I was just easing into the groove of LOTR fanfiction, finding a niche of writers who seemed to share my passion for accuracy with Tolkien's world, whose works it seemed safe to read. I came to Stars' work with the same tentative approach.

She blew me away.

The lyricism of her prose, oh my goodness. If it has a fault it is that the lyricism, in its exuberant abandon, detracts at times from the story itself. It borders on poetic. It is meant for reading aloud, for savoring every cadence and every beautiful English word. It is like sitting down to a banquet of the brightest jewel-hoard of our language. Stars seems to write for the sheer joy of words.

But what do these words do?

They paint a picture. A slow-burning, gradually unfolding picture of a failing kingdom and a treacherous plot, punctuated by terrible moments of jagged ferocity and tingling heroism. The characters swirl around a gradually thickening wheel of betrayal and danger, alive with urgency, cracking under strain. They are the wood-elves, fierce and fell and loyal, and their anger rises with the anger of the trees.

Where Shadows Breathe is like a dream, one might almost say, with its sizzling intensity and yet its odd constraint, its meanderings and its moments of sudden, vivid clarity, and the growing sense of nightmarish horror that builds around the climax. It is a dream that I have visited many times, and one that I cannot wait to see concluded.

Hannon le, Stars, mellon nin. Well done.