#i came to the lotr hobbit fandom late
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The King and The Hobbit
I've ventured into a new fandom with a short piece that imagined Thorin survived The Battle of the Five Armies.
The King and the Hobbit (3928 words) by downstar
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: The Hobbit (Jackson Movies)
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Bilbo Baggins/Thorin Oakenshield
Characters: Thorin Oakenshield, Bilbo Baggins
Additional Tags: Fix-It, Post-Canon Fix-It, Post-Canon, Thorin Oakenshield Lives, First Time, POV Bilbo Baggins, Dwarves in the Shire, The Shire (Tolkien), Bag End (Tolkien), Love Confessions, Declarations Of Love, Friends to Lovers, Post-Hobbit, Dwarf/Hobbit Relationship(s), Non-Graphic Smut, Bottom Bilbo Baggins, Top Thorin Oakenshield, My First Work in This Fandom, bagginshield
Summary:
Several months after The Battle of the Five Armies, the dwarves travel to the Shire to celebrate Bilbo's birthday. One dwarf in particular arrives ahead of his company to reconnect with Bilbo.
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I recently did a marathon rewatch of LoTR and The Hobbit movies. I hadn't realized on first viewing how close to being canonical Thorin and Bilbo's love came. Thought I'd try my hand at this fandom and do a little Thorin lives piece. It was great fun to try out a new world and new voices.
With apologies if I made any canon errors! I am a pretty casual Tolkien fan.
EXCERPT:
It was two days before the 53rd birthday of Bilbo Baggins, and the dwarves of Erebor were on their way.
As much as the Hobbits of the Shire did not approve of Bilbo’s wandering ways, his contributions during The Battle of the Five Armies and the retaking of Erebor from the dragon Smaug were already passing into the realm of legend. So, plans had been underway for weeks to celebrate his birthday with a lavish party.
Reservations about his improper adventuring aside, what hobbit doesn’t love an excuse to throw a feast?
Bilbo accepted the honour reluctantly, and only on the condition that the dwarves with whom he’d shared the quest would be invited. That nearly derailed the whole thing then and there, but after a bit of squabbling and peacemaking, the council agreed to the conditions.
Bilbo had spent the last week bustling around Bag End, preparing for his visitors whose presence he felt was far more significant than his own turning of the year. It was no trivial matter to travel from Erebor to the Shire, even though the journey could be made in relative peace and safety - unlike their original quest. So he was aware of what a great honour it was for his friends to make the journey.
At the best of times, Bilbo could be full of nervous energy. It had been hard enough to keep up his facade as an ordinary, respectable Hobbit when he hadn’t gone off on an adventure. But now that the residents of the Shire knew that his respectability had been a facade, they looked at him even more askance. That, in turn, had made him even more self-aware, especially as it felt like the entire Shire was attending his birthday party. There was admiration and awe in the way the Shirefolk looked at him, as well. Just because a Hobbit didn’t want to go off fighting dragons themselves didn’t mean they didn’t admire his courage.
Admiration felt almost more awkward than disapproval to Bilbo. But he’d slowly been learning to lean into the attention. Still, he felt very relieved and excited that his dwarven friends would be attending as well. And one friend in particular.
Bilbo was just finishing stowing away the most valuable pieces of silver and sentimental knickknacks when there was a knock on his door.
As Hobbits tended to be very well-mannered about not dropping by unannounced so late, Bilbo convinced himself he’d imagined the knock and went right back to his tidying up.
The knock came again, this time harder and unmistakable.
Bilbo crept cautiously from the kitchen toward the entryway, peering around the corner and doing a little halt-step. The movement of a shadow outside the window convinced him there was indeed someone out there. He twitched his nose, flickered his fingers, then cautiously stepped forward to pull open the door.
The figure was broad-shouldered and heavily cloaked, and no hobbit.
A moment of fear spiked down Bilbo’s spine. His adventure had shown him the wide word, but it had also made him much more aware of the mortal danger that most hobbits had the good fortune to never see. He started to reach for Sting, which hung just behind an old coat he kept by the door.
“You look upon me as an enemy, Bilbo Baggins. Surely these few months haven’t changed things between us so much.”
Bilbo immediately stopped reaching for his sword. The spike of fear turned to joy. “Thorin?!”
The bulky figure passed into the light of Bilbo’s entryway, revealing the most welcome face of the King Under the Mountain. Thorin smiled, the corners of his eyes wrinkling. “You sound surprised. Did you not invite us? Shall I go?” He motioned behind him.
Bilbo stood there staring at Thorin. They hadn’t seen each other in many, many months. When he’d left Erebor, Thorin was still under the care of Tauriel, whose Elven healing had saved him a mere breath from death’s door. Even then, his recovery had been long and slow, and Bilbo wasn’t certain that the King of Erebor would have the strength to make the journey to the Shire.
But now, here he was, standing right in front of him. Bilbo stared at him, and as he did, familiar, confusing feelings bubbled to the surface. He was somehow more handsome and noble than even his memory. He looked hale and healthy, though one hand held a silver-topped cane.
“Well?” asked Thorin with a roll of amused thunder in his tone. “Can I come in? I won’t do you the dishonour of pushing my way in uninvited as my kin and I once did.”
“Oh yes! Yes of course. You are most welcome. Most welcome, indeed. Come, come,” Bilbo reached out to catch Thorin’s arm and pull him inside. He looked past him and stepped out onto the porch. He’d expected a gaggle of dwarves to be in Thorin’s company, but the lane was quiet save for the singing of cicadas. “You’re alone?”
“I left my company behind in Bree, where they will stay for the night. They will make their way here tomorrow. But I wanted to come ahead, to see you before the madness of the celebration to come.”
Bilbo closed the rounded door and found himself staring at Thorin again. He wore a travelling cloak, but as the weather was still mild, it was not rimmed in fur. Even without that added bulk, the broad set of his shoulders was apparent.
Bilbo reached for the cloak, and Thorin shrugged it off into his hands. He staggered under the weight of it. “Please, come in. Have a seat. I’ll make us some tea. Are you hungry?” He bustled off and gently set the heavy cloak on an armchair, then made his way back to the kitchen. He rocked on his feet, his whole body humming with unexpected excitement and a touch of nerves.
Thorin rested his cane against the wall. He stood a bit askance and it was clear he was favouring the side where the orc blade had cut him clean through and nearly taken his life. “I wish nothing of you but your company, Bilbo. But…” he grinned softly, “...a cup of tea would not go amiss.”
“Right! I’ll get right on that. I’ve got some lovely cakes as well. The food is quite horrible in Bree. You’re probably dying for a bit of proper food after so long on the road. I’ll…”
Bilbo’s bustling was stopped in its tracks when Thorin caught his arm.
Continue reading on Ao3
#fanfic#fanfiction#ao3#the hobbit#thorin x bilbo#bilbo baggins#the hobbit bilbo#thorin oakenshield#bagginshield#fix it fic#thorin fic#the shire#hobbits#bag end#fic rec#the hobbit fic#thilbo#bilbo x thorin
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One Year
I published what is now the first chapter of Autocorrelation a year ago. Twelve months later and I've got nearly 675k posted on AO3, another 100+k in my WIPS folder, and three different fic universes.
Whoa.
I'll be the first to admit, brevity, or finely crafted prose, are not my skills. Plenty of writers might post 1/10th of my WC with x10 of the quality. But I'm proud of my stories, of the plots that came to me in late nights or between meetings or the hundred of ideas I had watching and re-watching the Rings of Power.
(And I wax philosophical self-reflection on writing below the cut.)
I started off by thinking I would write my whole head canon of an in-universe world that lined up (insofar as possible with weird timelines and multiple versions of Tolkien's own histories), with TROP, LOTR, The Hobbit, The Silmarillion, and other lesser known Tolkien works in his Legendarium.
Of course the goal was to create a believable HEA for Sauron and Galadriel and I'm getting there! His redemption arc can't happen overnight, he did some real bad shit. But he's immortal, the Elves are immortal, and reckoning and reconciliation might be approached reluctantly, but also seem somewhat of an inevitability for eternal beings. They can't exactly toss everyone to the void each time one does something unspeakable. There'd be no one left in 100,000 years.
I digress. It's a saga. And while I don't like every plot decision and have put out some clunky scenes to get from A to B, on the whole, I not-so-humbly think it's alright!
Land of Enchantment and Kingdom of Rust are my foray into darkfic. But if anyone's keeping track, I do like a good fix it, even if it means confronting challenging and uncomfortable topics in the comfort and safety of fiction.
And then there's my Fluff AU which is not a WIP as I simply post sequential one-shots whenever I feel like it. Nothing but domestic fluff and smut with the teeniest bit of angst or hurt/comfort to keep it interesting.
If I don't finish one of my WIPS it means I died. I've really enjoyed writing and it's been a delightful journey to try something new (writing fiction), learn about and join fandom, share the brainrot, and interact with anyone who likes my stories even a fraction as much as I do.
Thank you to everyone who has welcomed me to this space and an extra special thank you to anyone who dared to read something I wrote, whether you liked it or not.
Cheers to another year of my new favorite pastime and a hyperfixation that's not going anywhere any time soon.
#writing#my wips#waxing philosophical#one year#three universes#and it ain't over#thanks everyone who keeps fandom positive and engaging!
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Tag Game: Shock Your Followers
10 facts that might shock your followers. Tagged by @curufiin and @elevenelvenswords - thank you so much for tagging me you lovely people.
Oooooh I love these. A good portion might not be shocking but rather interesting or funny and some you might know already because I cannot shut up about myself.
I naturally don't have any wisdom teeth.
I hated, I mean HATED Tolkien's writing until I was 23, saw the Hobbit movies and started reading The Hobbit and the Silm. Then everything changed. I've always loved the LOTR movies, though.
Once I almost got arrested by Interpol.
I'm a linguist and when I still actively worked in the field as a lecturer, I held several seminars on the structure of Quenya and Sindarin and got nominated for our university's teaching prize (let me brag about that ok).
I also know how to ride a horse, used to have one myself and there's little I miss more.
Before I started writing fanfic again in late 2023, I hadn't written any and barely anything in general in +/- 10 years. I also got active on Tumblr again after a 5 year break.
I can play the saxophone. :D
I had a long distance relationship with a person from Peru for 6 years. I've stayed in tiny villages in the Andes, I ate guinea pig and swam in the Amazon, spoke decent spanish and I love the country dearly. The plan was to get married there but sometimes things don't work out and that's btw also how I got back into fandom and Tumblr (combined with my dear @lvsifer pushing me) - needed something to comfort me.
I love excessive partying and excess in general. Glad I came to the right city for that.
One of my first irl crushes was a boy who always dressed up as the princess in kindergarten and that probably says a lot about me.
Tagging @blauerregen and @saintstars, everyone else who I can think of for this rn has already been tagged I believe.
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hey idk if u active but, u see im pretty new to lotr and the hobbit (ik i am late to the party) but i am really in need of some thorin x reader where the reader used to be from a royal family until orcs attacked her palace, as she becomes older she finds Gandalf who invites her to join Thorin's Company-- once in the company she tries to hide her identity since her story in known well in erebor, one day she hears the dwarves telling that story to Bilbo, and Thorin notices the pain in her eyes <3
Welcome to the Fandom! It's never too late and we're happy to have you! I hope you enjoy this:
(A/N: I wrote this without my glasses on, so I do apologize in advance if there are any mistakes)
“You haven’t heard?” Bofur turned to Bilbo with wide eyes. The Company was all gathered around the campfire, sitting around in a circle together as they waited to eat their dinner of a rabbit stew that Bombur was cooking.
“Well us hobbits don’t hear much, unless it’s the stories Gandalf tells us,” It was true, hobbits weren’t known for leaving the comforts of their homeland and the only news they got was through the travelers and merchants that came through their towns. They wouldn’t necessarily call that reliable, though.
“Well…” Bofur looked around, face growing grim as he recalled the story. “The (L/n) family, known for their kindness and democratic policies-” Bofur began explaining how well loved your family was, making you raise a brow. Not often did someone state this part of your history.
“It was a full moon in the middle of winter…” Bofur’s words made you stiff, your body tensing and your eyes suddenly hyper-focused your vision on the dirt near the fire as you realized what story he was about to tell.
“The orcs of the West banded together and entered the kingdom in a secret fashion, doing silent kills of the guards along their way to the castle gates.”
The entire Company grew quiet, all knowing how sad the event was.
“While the royal family was sleeping, they entered the palace.”
Shutting your eyes, you tried to take deep breaths through your nose as each memory of that night flashed through your mind.
“Where are you going?” You asked your big brother, looking at him with wide eyes as he put you in the secret tunnels beneath the floor. He was nervous, breathing heavily as he gave you a bag of clothes and food.
“I’ll be right back, I need to grab-” You couldn’t hear what else he said as he mumbled to himself, shutting you down in the tunnels for safety as he left the room.
As you sat in the darkness, suddenly screams filled the halls, making your eyes widen as you looked up at the latch.
Covering your mouth, you held in your own cries of terror as footsteps thudded on the ground above you.
“No, please!” Your brother pleaded, making tears sting your eyes as you heard the swish of a blade, maniacal laughter following it. A sickening crunch was heard as your brother’s body was disfigured for sport, the blood seeping down through the floor, dripping near your feet.
“They say the princess escaped,” Bofur continued the story, oblivious to your painful memories. “Her body was never found with the rest of the family, and they suspect that the family knew for years about plots against them,”
“Why would they suspect that?”
“They found plans in the king’s office that indicated they wanted to build secret bunkers and tunnels for safety.”
Thorin wasn’t really paying attention to Bofur anymore, instead honing in on you as you looked at the ground. Your eyes were glassy as you recalled the stench of death when you came back to your home days later. The images of their bodies engraved in your mind as well as the blood splatter caked onto the family portraits. They had tried to run, but they weren’t fast enough.
You remembered the bile that filled up in your throat when you saw them, the way you ran to the nearest bathroom to vomit in the midst of your sobbing.
Zoning back into reality, you realized a single tear traveled down your face. Making it look like you were adjusting your hair, you carefully wiped your face, but the pain in your eyes lingered.
“Stew’s ready,” Ori called out to the group. You watched as everyone got up to get their food, Bilbo pausing when you didn’t stand up.
“Are you going to eat?”
“Nah, not very hungry right now.” You replied, faking a smile as you got up to go to your bedroll.
Thorin stood, carefully making his way over to you. The pain on your face was unmistakable, something only someone who lost everything could detect. Just like him, you lost your family and your home.
“I am so sorry for your loss,” He murmured lowly so no one could hear him. Your eyes snapped to lock with his as shock took its place on your face as he gave you a sad smile.
“What’re you talking about?” You faked nonchalance, tilting your head.
Thorin shook his head at you, understanding why you would still want to hide your identity.
“You don’t have to say anything, just know that you have someone to talk to if you so wish.”
As Thorin began to walk away, you replied, voice barely above a whisper.
“What will you do, now that you know?” You were terrified, the last time someone found out you were hunted for weeks like a rabbit being chased by hungry wolves.
Thorin turned back to you, looking over his shoulder for the briefest moments to ensure you still had your privacy.
“I will protect you.”
Tags:
Thorin-
@greennightspider @ashleygrrrl @skylarkvip @makeshift-prime @jumpingmanatee @meraki--mei @theelvenvalkyrie @dabisburntnut @queenofmankind @elvish-sky
Forever Tag
@lady-of-lies @all-things-fandomstuck @fizzyxcustard @izzydaelleth @aquaangel18 @raindancer2004 @love-colorfulglittercollection @ladylouoflothlorien @ten-tenya-iida @legolaslovely @bthtallmadge2 @abesottedlass @wilhelmyna @tigereyesf @aspookybunny @keijibum @moony-artnstuff @sirkekselord @guardianofrivendell @fluffymadamina @izbelross @fandomhoe101 @acahope311 @kitkatd7 @mooseetx @themerriweathermage @elvish-sky @bitter-sweet-farmgirl @laurfilijames @frequentlychangingfandoms @cameronsails @linasofia @starryeyedrogue @shethereadinghobbit @beenovel @onlystarshere @fckmini @spidergirla5 @i-did-not-mean-to @lathalea @myselfandfantasy @strange-old-worlds @otakumultimuse-hiddlewhore @broken-ghost @mbruben-stein
#thorin x reader#reader-insert#fanfiction#fanfic#the hobbit fanfiction#the hobbit fanfic#the hobbit x reader#the hobbit imagines#the hobbit#xreader#thorin oakenshield
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Since you seem to be litigating rpf right now and since you’ve been around awhile, I wanted to ask you about how it’s evolved, if you haven’t already talked about that? I’ve been in fandom for maybe 15ish years, and I remember reading a lot of rpf back then (when rps seemed like more common terminology), and I feel like there were more defined lines between fans and the real people they wrote about. A lot of “if you got here by googling yourself, go back” disclaimers vs the current culture where some fans seem to show the people or ask them about fic and art and other fan works. It’s like there was a culture of secrecy before where there was less of a desire for the fanworks to ever reach their subjects, rpf or otherwise. I think most rpf writers/creators still feel that way, but I see so many awkward interview panels where actors/etc are being asked about fanfic. Is this in my head, or is the shift real?
--
Heh. Well, I was never a fan of any boy bands or the like until bitten by the BTS bug. I didn't even know who BSB and NSYNC were at the height of their popularity. So I did not always have a front-row seat to RPF evolution, but as far as I know, it went something like this in English-speaking spaces:
Prehistory: 1960s magazines were full of "Your night on a date with [member of the Monkees]" type stories. Music RPF was floating around in various forms for a long, long time, though the m/m band member/band member stuff tended to be extremely locked down, often with the names replaced.
From Eroica with Love shows how horny everybody was for Led Zeppelin back then. I can only presume there were doujinshi of the members in Japanese, but I'm not really familiar with what was going on over there.
Idols & Visual Kei: English-speaking fandom of Asian groups was into RPF by the early 00s and perhaps before. I was tangentially aware of this stuff from being in anime fandom but wasn't interested because I wasn't into most of the music itself. (Also, this was the era of limewire computer viruses or paying like $60 to get a Japanese album legally in the US.)
Johnny's Entertainment fandom is what I associate with this, circa 2001. On the visual kei side, people were shipping Malice Mizer around then.
Godawful 2003 vampire movie Moon Child, starring Gackt (of Malice Mizer and solo fame) and Hyde of L'Arc~en~Ciel (yes, with a fucking tilde) did make people ship their characters but certainly did not dissuade people from shipping the guys themselves.
Popslash - Ye olde slash fandom converts: On the very, very Western side of things, all of the oldschool slashers started catching the RPF bug for "popslash" in the late 90s/early 00s. Prior to this, RPF was a HARD NO for much of this crowd and continued to be seen as a dirty secret. This umbrella term was intended for specifically BSB, NSYNC, and a few other pop stars, not just fic of any pop act. I don't know if people were calling it "RPS". I think they were just calling it "popslash", but I wasn't on the mailing lists and things. This was a pre-LJ era with that older infrastructure.
LOTR - Ye olde slash fandom converts again: Those that didn't get sucked in by popslash fell to LotRiPS when the Lord of the Rings movies came out in the early 00s. RPS was still seen as a shocking dirty secret before the advent of this fandom. Afterwards... people still hated it, but they'd realized there was no way to fully keep it out of their spaces. This also coincided with the move from the bajillions of LOTR (non RPF) archives with picky rules and mailing lists ruled with an iron fist to LJ with people's personal blogs full of their ungovernable wrong opinions and terrible taste in fandoms on display for all the world to see.
There was so much structured behind the scenes material for the LOTR movies that it formed a kind of canon of its own along with the press tours, and the actors were cuddly with each other. I don't think this is easy to understand now. Even the Hobbit movies didn't have this vibe, and there's so much more behind the scenes info and so many more youtube clips for everything now that the effect is much diminished. At the time, LOTR felt like a new era in sff franchise media.
There was tons of any two gu... um... somewhat generic hot porn, so even if you didn't care much for RPF, it became an attractive fandom. At this point, people were calling it "RPS", not "RPF", despite there being some femslash and het in the same spaces as all the Viggo/Orlando. The domlijah tinhats were notorious and did go bother the actors, I think?
The height of this fandom coincided with the height of cringey photomanips and "Why are their necks broken?" art with actors' faces on it. Fanartist The Theban Band was well known, though more for FPF than RPF. It's just that when you use the actual actors' faces, things tend to get conflated. Now, whether people started bothering most of the actors at the time in the early 00s, I don't know. Fanlore suggests that misuse of The Theban Band's art was already well underway in 2004. It's also often this stuff that Graham Norton bothers actors with years later.
It's not so much that fandom or RPF fandom changed at this point as that new people were into RPF who hadn't been before and much more importantly, the internet was changing. The level of access to actors and the level of awareness of online fandoms was changing radically around here. It changed again with Twitter and so forth, but this was still a major point in internet history.
Rockfic: "Rockfic" as seen on the Rockfic archive got started at some point. They meant Metallica, Bon Jovi, etc. I mostly know about them because there was beef between them and some of the popslash and bandom people around the time OTW was starting. (Popslash and bandom but not rockfic communities being well represented among OTW founders.)
Bandom: "Bandom" is another umbrella term with a general sound but a specific meaning. It was used for Fall Out Boy, My Chemical Romance, Panic! at the Disco, and associated bands. This RPF fandom got big on LJ at the height of LJ fandom. It sucked in plenty of Western fandoms types who hadn't been into RPF before.
At the time, some of these bands and their associates weren't that famous, and they had personal Livejournals. It was not unusual for people peripherally involved with the actual people to be in the same spaces as the RPF. This was very much not appreciated by a lot of the fic authors. Band reactions seem to have varied between "yuck" and "Why doesn't anyone ship MEEEE? Don't you think I'M hot???" and other jokey lack of boundaries stuff.
A lot of the "Go away, X" disclaimers that sound like jokes are from this era and are due to some of these people actively going looking for the lulz.
Hockey - The final nail in the coffin for ye olde slash fandom: If the Popslash and LotRiPS waves didn't get people, Hockey did. After SGA, all the big slash writers that people follow from fandom to fandom seemed to be going to Hockey RPF.
Asianfanfics.com: Meanwhile, on the Asian media side of things, sites like Asianfanfics have been going strong for ages and are full of kpop rpf and the like.
Wattpad: Wattpad was the home of not only the Larries but of soooo much more Mary Sue/1D guy, and now Mary Sue/Jungkook.
--
How the boundaries are really depends on the era and the fandom.
The Rockfic archive used to make you pay a buck to sign up or something. It was extremely locked down, from what I remember, as you'd expect from a very old community writing m/m about macho bands.
The hockey people don't tend to be all up in players' faces because the players were mega, mega, mega famous long before the RPF fandom got big and because half the fandom doesn't even like sports: they're just there for the m/m AUs.
The Wattpad fandoms are a toxic hive of no boundaries and 13-year-olds posting their porn and too much personal info, but with fandoms as big as 1D or BTS, you can figure that plenty of individual people behave themselves.
Asking actors about fic in panels has become more common over the years, I think, though people have also learned to head it off better. I wouldn't say this is a RPF-specific phenomenon though.
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13-14-15 for the fic asks
Hello Anon...
13. 𝐹𝒾𝓇𝓈𝓉 𝒻𝒶𝓃𝒹𝑜𝓂 𝓎𝑜𝓊 𝑒𝓋𝑒𝓇 𝓌𝓇𝑜𝓉𝑒 𝒻𝑜𝓇?
Okay, this might sound SUPER dumb, but I tried to back in time in my mind, and...it's Tolkien.
(cue laughter)
I have started writing at age 9-10, in another language, mostly sad poems that make me cringe now...
I distinctly remember that, later, I read LOTR fanfiction in secret (Only I didn't know that that was the name for it), and I wrote some on my parents' computer. It has been deleted and was (hopefully) never read by anyone, because - if it has - it means that my parents have read it. LOL
14. 𝒲𝒽𝒶𝓉’𝓈 𝓎𝑜𝓊𝓇 𝒻𝒶𝓋𝑜𝓇𝒾𝓉𝑒 𝒻𝒶𝓃𝒹𝑜𝓂 𝓉𝑜 𝓌𝓇𝒾𝓉𝑒 𝒻𝑜𝓇?
Still Tolkien. Only now, I am an old bitch who came to proper fandom way too late and has no idea what she's doing.
When I say Tolkien, I mean The Hobbit, LOTR, and the Silm specifically. I am not very well versed in the other books.
15. 𝒲𝒽𝒶𝓉’𝓈 𝓉𝒽𝑒 𝓌𝑒𝒾𝓇𝒹𝑒𝓈𝓉 𝒻𝒶𝓃𝒹𝑜𝓂 𝓎𝑜𝓊’𝓋𝑒 𝑒𝓋𝑒𝓇 𝓌𝓇𝒾𝓉𝓉𝑒𝓃 𝒻𝑜𝓇?
I will say that I've never engaged with any other fandom at all.
Nevertheless, I have written stories that are crossovers and/or for another fandom. The strangest is probably the German short I've written about Cremble from POTC. It's not in the least about POTC. I am just very fascinated by Adam Brown.
(Otherwise Hannibal, Lucifer, or the Sparkhouse. Definitely Sparkhouse)
Thank you so much for this ask, this was tremendous fun lol
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interesting to see what remain from my follow list from before I left Tumblr a few years ago.
a few treasured mutuals
gaud, Neil, dduane
a bunch of good omens blogs (I guess there's been a revival lately huh)
several indie/fanfic writers/artists that I was too poor to patreon
the Jewish activism blogs (I do remember being super into Jewish culture to the point I was sometimes embarrassed to talk about it with my actually Jewish partner ... like, I was afraid he'd think I was fetishizing it, and I wasn't quite sure where my fascination came from... but then I realized my step-grandpa was from a Jewish family and was a holocaust refugee and this was never openly discussed in my family lore and I have Feelings™ about that)
the general Tumblr shitpost atmosphere is actually restored after the Ban...
human fandom is still a trend, poetic renditions of simple wants and pleasures, and ofc reviving classic posts
SPN blogs are still here, Wayne family blogs are still here, I still see my not-my-fandom blocked tags (marvel and spn) a lot ...
classstruggleanarchism is still here with the anarchist content Tumblr and they seem to be more informed and eloquent. same for most leftblr to be honest. fake news still abound but it seems less. or maybe it's just I'm following less people now.
and who is not here?
most glaring is the absence of the many LOTR blogs I folllowed, where did they go? did lotrblr as a whole move to Instagram? come on, Tumblr was the home of Owl-eyed-flatearth-elves and of translating/localizing hobbit names As Tolkien Intended, did we already lose that?
I also see a much lower presence of gifsets and history in general. there are lots of certified post accounts but I haven't seen actual worldheritagepost posts in a while
I am super happy to see my dash is less angry, less combative, and I see less gatekeeping, less rule-pushing, and blessedly less pealclutching "stop kink at pride" discourse (that was what drove me off Tumblr back then)
Trans activists VS terfs seem to remain pretty much as they were, which is ... eh. I knew that from how the rest of the internet was. At least the queer community in general seems to be more inclusive (terfs excluded ofc).
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something you're excited about AND top 5 characters currently ❤️
Oh heya! 👋💖 I already answered here what I'm most excited about, so. :3
My top 5 characters?
Cahir (The Witcher). He's my newest conquer so duh. This knight bitch already (kind of) caught my interest on the last previous seasons of TW because I mean - a cunty, ambitious, antagonistic guy on a holy mission, any means necessary? Yeah. But I was still like, hmm, he's kinda, you know, but I don't know. But s3, this season? He was just really kind of pathetic (like a sad, wet little kitten compared to the murderous little twink that he was in s1), but still cool and complex, and I decided that's it. I'm putting him in a box and taking him home with me. Like, villain/antagonistic dudes with potential redemption arcs? Sign me the fuck up.
Billy Hargrove (Stranger Things). I may not have been really active in this fandom lately because... well, you know. But he's still mine and you can pry this bitch from my cold, dead hands. I originally didn't care much for him in s2 (I didn't hate him by any means but I just couldn't take him and his macho-ism seriously lol), but then s3 came and his character arc just... fucked me up. Broke my heart. Like he had wronged and sinned, yes; he was a massive bitch and a bully, sure. But he was also never really given a chance to properly redeem himself, at any point in the show imo. And that fucked me up and broke my heart and so he's mine.
Ellen Ripley (Alien). My first (bi) awakening and also the first female protagonist that I felt like I could really look up to. She may not be big and muscular, or a man-hating girlboss who doesn't cry or show emotion when she feels bad, but she kicks ass. She kicks alien butt. She's a woman but she has big balls. She fucks. And she loves cats, too. And that I can appreciate. A lot.
Cara Mason (Legend of the Seeker). I feel like this is a recurring theme with me but a character who starts off as an antagonist/villain and then gets a redemption arc? Yeah. Like, she's also gone through so much shit in her life - she's been forced to go through hell and back and raised to believe emotions mean weakness - and then she allies with the protagonist and slowly finds home with him and his 'merry band', and starts to *feel* things and even show *emotion* and like. A simple girl like me, with simple tastes - how could I watch a character unfold like that and not feel *anything*? Anything at all? Impossible. Yeah, so she's also mine.
Fili (The Hobbit). I feel like he's a bit of wild card in this group because he isn't an antagonist with a complex story line, or some big ass protagonist ready to save the world. But I had such a huge crush on him when the Hobbit movies came out about 10 years ago, and having recently rewatched/revisited the LotR & Hobbit trilogies, I realized just how much I loved him back then and how much I love him even now. He didn't get a lot of screen time, not even that many lines. But his bravery, stubbornness and will to defy his 'destiny' and go to the edge of the earth, hell and back, to protect his baby brother touched me. Through his character, I also found his actor, Dean O'Gorman, and his numerous other acting projects and man, he's great. The Deano fandom has also been kind, chill and just a great place to hang out at every now and then, so. It's all thanks to this "golden lion prince" dwarf here.
#replies#hotdadlicense#<333#why was making this list so goddamn hard?????#like i have so many favorite characters#how could i just choose top 5#seriously#i also realized that all three antagonist/redemption arc types that i love are/were all played by australian actors like jkjkgkgj#why don't i just move there already#anyway thanks for the ask love <3
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MARRIAGE BRAIDS
#lotr#the hobbit#gigolas#i came to the lotr hobbit fandom late#i mean i started really being a part of it when the hobbit movies came out but i had read the books seen the movies much much earlier#so its not late in like modern fandom timelines but late for my own#but it owns so much of me and has a hold on me#and its like 90% due to marriage braids#contraband twizzlers
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Okay, so, I've watched the movies and I've read The Big Three, though I'm still a little shaky on my Silmarillion lore if I'm being honest. Where do I go from here if I want to read more Tolkien? Is there a commonly followed reading order? Should I just go by publication date? (Yes I am motivated to get into deeper lore because of your blog, that's why I'm asking you lmfao)
Oh hey! Happy to see my blog dragging people deeper down into the black hole of increasingly obscure Tolkien works!
I actually have a friend reading the Silm for the first time and I'm already making my little evil plans that can be summed up by "If she doesn't hate it, what can I tempt her to read next?" So I've been giving it a lot of thought lately, actually! Which is why this post ended up, uh, long.
I've taken the liberty of adapting this answer a little bit just in case I have any followers who have read fewer books than you have and find this useful. Hope you don't mind it!
The best way to read Tolkien depends a lot on what you enjoy. If you thought The Hobbit was too childish, don't read his stories for children. If your eyes glazed over when poems came up in LotR, don't pick a poetry book. If The Silmarillion drove you to tears, maybe wait before you get into the more scholarly works.
Availability is also something to consider. Maybe your local library has a few titles already, or you happen to find a good copy of something in a used bookstore, or there's a deal that saves you a lot of money. Alternatively, maybe you're set on reading something but can't find it. You might also fall in love with a story through fandom and want More Of It, or see a pretty edition that you just Must Own. These are all okay! See, the thing about Tolkien is that generally speaking, you can read his works in almost any order, so be open to changing your plans as stuff comes up in your life. I'd be willing to take a bet that the minority of fans read his stuff in any way that makes any sense lol
Personally, I think it makes sense to read in this sequence:
Read these first
The core stuff
The Hobbit
The Lord of the Rings
The Silmarillion
These are the Big Three, and you should probably get to them before you get to anything else.
The Silmarillion might take a couple of attempts to get through depending on how comfortable you are with the style, and I personally had to read it from cover to cover twice before I felt like I had a good grasp on it. @askmiddlearth has a pretty good guide that my friend who's reading it is finding really helpful.
Stories you already know: now with 200% more detail
Most other books won't be Silm levels of difficult, btw! But many assume you're familiar with it, simply because Hobbit-LotR-Silm are usually the ones most people read. So even if I otherwise follow a generally "easiest to hardest" logic, the Silm belongs here.
As an addendum, I would say the LotR appendices are a good bridge, stylistically speaking, to the Silmarillion.
The books in this category can be read in any order you feel like - you already know how they fit together.
Unfinished Tales
The Great Tales of Middle Earth, which is a series containing the following standalone books:
The Children of Hurin
Beren and Luthien
The Fall of Gondolin
Here you'll find mostly unfinished, often contradictory versions of stories you already know - but with lots of awesome detail that fandom tends to consider canon as much as we can.
These are books which contain both stories by Tolkien and commentary by his son Christopher, explaining his father's creative process and taking educated guesses as to how stories connect together and so on. It's a gentle introduction to more hardcore scholarship and if you can handle long tumblr meta I'm sure you can handle these.
Oh, and of these four books, Children of Hurin is the easiest to read by far, so maybe begin from that one. You might even read it before The Silmarillion and possibly before The Lord of the Rings (especially if you've watched the movies) - it's a pretty straightforward novel.
Read these in any order you want
I'm listing them in the order I think makes the most sense, but if you've read the books above you can just pick any section here according to your interest
Fairy tale essays, short poems, short stories and such things
The Adventures of Tom Bombadil and Other Verses from the Red Book
Farmer Giles of Ham
Tree and Leaf
Smith of Wootton Major
The Father Christmas Letters
Mr Bliss
Roverandom
Tales from the Perilous Realm
These aren't technically legendarium relevant but are delightful if you like fantasy. A lot (but not all) of these are very light reading and excellent to read to children who aren't ready for the actual legendarium yet, or to turn to as a break from heavier material.
I really wanted to make separate sections for children's literature and things that just happen to be fairy tales but immediately noticed I had no idea when a fairy tale becomes too grown up to be children's literature, so a single section it is
The Deep Lore™️
You know when Frodo inherits Bilbo's papers (and then Sam inherits Frodo's) and they have to make sense of it? That's what it's like reading HoME.
The History of Middle Earth series, or HoME for short.
(There are 12 books in this series. It's probably a terrible idea to read them out of order, so I won't even list them here)
Basically, these are nearly all the scraps of paper by Tolkien that could be found at the time, put together chronologically and presented with commentary. Here you can find answers to like 80% of the questions you might have after reading the other books, and then answers to a million other questions you didn't actually have.
This feels more like reading a library than a book series - whether this makes you want to read it more or less depends on your taste.
Also! Last year they released The Nature of Middle Earth, which is in the same vein as these but I haven't read it yet so I don't feel quite comfortable saying "Oh yeah this is when you should read it!"
Tolkien as a person: biography, letters and essays
JRR Tolkien: A Biography (by Humphrey Carpenter)
The Letters of JRR Tolkien
The Monsters and the Critics and Other Essays
I'm not the best person to ask about studying Tolkien as a person, but these are probably the most famous (and important) books.
The Letters also contain a lot of info about Middle Earth, so they might be worth taking a look even if you, like me, don't feel like reading tons of biographies.
For fans of all things medieval
The Fall of Arthur
Beowulf: A Translation and Commentary, together with Sellic Spell
Finn and Hengest: The Fragment and the Episode
The Legend of Sigurd and Gudrun
The Story of Kullervo
Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Pearl and Sir Orfeo
The Lay of Aotrou and Itroun
These are all translations, commentaries or deliberate imitations of actual medieval texts, as opposed to the ahistorical quasimedieval thing the legendarium has got going on. You probably shouldn't touch these if poetry scares you, though.
And that's it...?
Not really, no. There are other publications if you're a completist, but these are the major ones in every category I can think of. There should be some 30-40 books here anyway, so this should keep you busy for a while!
Note that I won't revisit this post to update it every time a new book is released, so for more recent books, use your best judgment!
#reading order#<< for my own reference if someone ever asks me again or i do manage to get my friend down the rabbit hole#in which i am forced to confront my lifestyle choices as i realize how much tolkien i've read#me @ me diversify your reading material fgs#hyperfixations are truly impossible to explain
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A year ago today, I began my final semester at Rutgers University, finishing up my long-put-off BA degree. My degree is in History, but I also had to choose a minor, so I went with English.
I'd taken a class in Children's Lit in the Fall of 2020, and absolutely adored the professor. When scheduling for my last semester, I saw he was teaching a class on Criticism and Culture of 20th Century Literature, and was definitely interested.
Then I saw the subtopic- JRR Tolkien.
Hesitation. I'd read (or attempted to read) The Hobbit when I was about nine. I hated it. Put it down about 1/3 of the way through and never picked it up again. I actively avoided any and all things Tolkien from that moment on.
But....
I really did love Professor Jackson's style of teaching - he didn't care if you agreed with him, and in fact preferred pushback on what we discussed in class. So... I decided to risk spending fourteen weeks reading and discussing The Hobbit and the LOTR.
The first day of class, the fanboys went absolutely silent when, during that godawful "get to know you" portion of class, I said I wasn't a fan of Tolkien and had actually taken the class to challenge myself. They were shocked--shocked, says I.
But...
I fell in love with the books. Then I had to see the movies. And since June of 2021, I've written some 750k words in Hobbit/Richard Armitage fanfiction. Until the spring of 2021, I didn't even know who RA was, if you can believe that. 😂
I came back to Tumblr after a looooong hiatus and found the fandoms here and they are the most welcoming people I've ever met. I've made so many wonderful friends here - like my fellow Thorin simps:
@i-did-not-mean-to @lathalea @bitter-sweet-farmgirl @linasofia @fizzyxcustard @legolasbadass @kibleedibleedoo @xxbyimm @laurfilijames @thewarriorandtheking
And these awesome peeps -@shalinizhara @lordoftherazzles @sketch-and-write-lover @enchantzz @blueberryrock @sherala007 @tschrist1
And so many others as well!!
So long story short (too late!) it's because of this one class and this one amazing professor that I'm here now. And to everyone who has read, commented, reblogged my fics - thank you so much! I 💜 you all!
#pixie rambles#richard armitage#the hobbit#thorin oakenshield#LOTR#Stay Close#Ray Levine#fanfiction#writer
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I saw your tags on the post on Tolkien’s notes and I wanted to chime in that I feel like it’s this part of this conception of authorial intent as the be all end all of interpreting fiction. I don’t wanna use “fandom” terms but “canon” as the author explains it seems to be the be all end all when it comes to discussing work, especially Tolkien.
Ah yes! Idk this is a personal thing but I just utterly DESPISE the cult of personality that's sprung up around Tolkien, especially because I feel like you can't separate the "deification of Tolkien" from the way LoTR has been turned into a Marvel-style Mega-franchise. Like? If Tolkien's words are the only ones that matter, and your estate corporation is the one who "legally owns" Tolkien's words, you have a vested interest in pushing the idea that Tolkien's take on the story is the Only take that matters and your "official" continuation/adaptations are inherently more meaningful than anyone else's.
You can also make biopic movies like Tolkien where you literally just take random details of Tolkien's life and trauma and package it up as a product to be sold, completely divorced from the stories he wrote. And it has to be divorced from them, because you legally don't own the rights to make an adaptation of them. laskjdflaksdjfsdf
I guess that's sorta why I care so little about the Amazon series, even though I don't think it's really that different from adaptations of the past? Like on one hand I love Lotr adaptations, even bad ones! And I don't think there was ever a time when the franchise was "pure" or "uncommercialized." People saying "the books are pure stories unlike the adaptations which are commercial trash" feel like people saying "the harry potter books are pure stories and it's just the movies that are commercial trash." Idk I feel like everyone Wants there to be a time when Lord of the Rings was perfect and pure and untainted by capitalism or whatever, but that time never existed. Lord of the Rings was never pure.
But I guess just world events lately/learning more about the studio machinations that produce things like the Hobbit films/watching with growing horror as amazon and disney take over the world has made me more and more incapable of ignoring that and enjoying a thing I used to love. Idk.
Because I know there are talented artists working on the amazon products, in the same way there are talented artists working on Disney's star wars products! And I don't doubt they will do as much as they can to create engaging stories, and create some quality content to advertise Amazon's new streaming service!
But when that Amazon series teaser image came out, everyone was so excited about seeing Telperion and Laurelin while I was sorta like... "yes they certainly did buy the rights to Valinor (tm) and Telperion(tm) and Laurelin(tm), but I've seen far more interesting versions of the trees in fanart and fancomics.......owning the rights to make an adaptation about a thing doesn't automatically make it good or exciting aslkadfjsldkfjlsdf"
#ahhh yeah sorry this was a tangent i have feelings#lotr#overthinkinglotr#also im gonna finally admit it#I hate the silmarillion#ok maybe hate is a strong word........more 'im utterly indifferent to the silmarillion'#'a lot of silm fans are really cool and have great takes and deepened my understanding of the story and the silm's place in it'#'ive liked some fandom stuff and i liked drawing the characters as cats'#but#i think it is objectively Bad and retroactively weakens lord of the rings#as a matter of personal preference and I could write an entire essay about it#woof#it feels good to say it out loud#Im a fake fan ive been lying to you all for years#;-;#anyway everyone should unfollow my blog I am a liar#but anyway I feel very strongly that the silmarillion is overrated and is Not the key to interpreting Lord of the Rings or whatever#ive just kept quiet about it because i dont have the energy#and i want people to like me#lol
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Favorite Character from 10 Fandoms
I was tagged by @shieldmaidenofsherwood and @exlibrisfangirl. Thanks for thinking of me! No thanks for making me make decisions. :(
Rules: List your favorite character from 10 different fandoms and then tag 10 people.
Rather than try to actually chose, I'm just going to do the last 10 characters I used their tag to find fic for on Ao3, from most recent to least.
Nyx Ulric from Kingsglaive/Final Fantasy XV. RIP to your feeds; this man has captured my attention for almost a full year now. Wow. He is trying so hard to save his friends in spite of everything, but also isn't afraid to chew people out who need to hear it. There are so many blanks to fill in, too.
Elrond Peredhil from the Hobbit/LotR/Silmarillion. A very old, but enduring fave from back when my dad read the Hobbit to me when I was eight or so and started my love for Tolkien. He was wise and smart and helpful, and gave people shelter. Instant fave. Nice to see him getting some more love lately!
Cordelia Naismith Vorkosigan from the Vorkosigan Saga. All you people here on tumblr made me decide to start the series and I adored her and her husband and so was very disappointed to see less of them as the series shifted to their son, not that he isn't fantastic! But I've always had a weakness for the previous generation, so this is nothing new.
Luke Skywalker from Star Wars, my original blorbo, as the children say. I got introduced to Star Wars when I was six and it has been an obsession ever since. What can I say, I am basic and weak for main characters. I was heavy into the EU and so I started to draw away when Episode II came out and I could see it killing itself trying to cope with contradictions, but Luke, with such a burden always trying will always be a favorite.
4b. Mara Jade also has gotten a character tag search, but she is in the same fandom so she doesn't get her own number. But don't neglect her!
Jason Todd from Batman comics. I fell sideways into this fandom through an old mutual who loved him, and since that's how I came into the fandom I have stuck with him. I tend to latch onto a character and stay loyal, so here I am, through some very bizarre characterization and storyline choices, having learned from this man and fandom how to pick and chose fanon and canon very harshly. Definitely a character that when written well is very very good, and when written badly (or how I don't like) is horrid.
5b. This is basically a (hopefully more mature) carbon copy of how I got into BtVS through a friend obsessed with Spike.
Clark Kent from Superman comics/shows (yes this counts as separate fandoms). Another oldie. My grandparents had the 1940s cartoons as some of the few brother-approved VHS tapes they had, so I watched a lot of it, and then STAS came out and I was hooked. What can I say, I love characters who always try so hard to be the best they can be, and the reminder that even the Man of Tomorrow, for all his powers, can't do everything.
Meliara Astiar and Vidanric Renselaus from Crown & Court Duel by Sherwood Smith. Yes, both of them, shut up. I got on a nostalgia kick and they have a few excellent fics on Ao3. Ultimate culture clash, all the tropes and they make it work.
Trafalgar Law from One Piece. (No, I am not caught up and will not be until Wano is done.) He...he also tries so hard but in a different way. He tries to be serious in Luffy's world and it never works and it's great. Trash man trying to be creepy and trying so hard. And he's genuinely badass, he just cares too much and it cracks me up. And then his backstory breaks my heart.
Eve Baird from The Librarians (tv show). Mama Baird knows what she wants and knows her skills and is doing all she can to protect her idiot Librarian and equally chaotic LITs, but isn't afraid to admit when she needs to learn from them as well.
Alberich from Valdemar by Mercedes Lackey. Another nostalgia lookup, with even less fic. I like mentors, okay? I like older people learning and teaching and I always have, even when I was young. I actually haven't read much of this series, but I got his two books and enjoyed them, and didn't do much with the rest.
I'm going to chose to interpret the lack of women on this list as a critique of the books I read and not solely of me myself. But it's a good trend to see as I try to figure out what to procrastinate by reading next. (as is the appalling lack of explicit POC. Ouch.)
Again, these are the most recent character tag searches I've done on Ao3, not my top 10 characters, because this took less decisions, honestly.
Absolutely no-pressure tagging of @garbria, @whumpwriterforlife, @starjunco, @sanzochan, @whostarlockeda03, @noirbriar, @newlyorange, and @maychorian, along with anyone else who wants to go. I would love to get more character reccs, honestly. It's gotten me started on two series that I've enjoyed but haven't gotten far enough in to seek out fic yet for risk of spoilers. ^_^
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I'm new to Tumblr and I'm a writer, I'm ready to share stories other than fanfiction. I mostly write horror stories, both short and novel length.
Fanfic
I also write fanfic for the following fandoms:
The Walking Dead
Supernatural
Vikings
Game of Thrones
True Blood
One Chicago (mostly PD)
911/Lone Star
Grey's Anatomy
Station 19
Criminal Minds
FBI/Most Wanted
SWAT
Buffy
LOTR
The Hobbit
Magicians
WWE/AEW
Marvel
DC
Original Stories
The People in the Trees - Summary - A family move to a 100+ old farm house on the outskirts of ____________ near the woods, for a fresh start and a new way of life. As they are settling in they notice weird noises coming from woods, not normal animal noises but something sinister. As if the noises weren’t enough they start to notice strange things in the house, stuff going missing, nightmares, the youngest child having an imaginary friend. Slowly they notice dark shadowy figures in the trees, slowly they piece together who they are, who leads them and what they want. What they want shakes the family to their core. (In progress: first pt posted a pt will post every Saturday)
The Power to Overcome - Summary: Teens/young adults of different nationalities, genders, sexual orientation, backgrounds, countries, personalities, religions, traditions, beliefs and traumas meet in a variety of ways that have to do with Magic, sorcery, witchcraft, Wicca. They learn to help each other harness their powers and face their tragic past.
Enchanted - Summary: Adrian grew up knowing his mom was a witch but it was it was their secret. When he turned 16 he got his powers and his whole world changed. His mom's secret was much bigger than he ever knew, she opened up a whole new world for him. He is introduced to many new witches and warlocks and along with his mother is drawn into a battle between good and evil and the fate of the world.
Trapped - At 22 years old Nicole was a happy college student set for med school. Until she stayed late at the library studying for her ______ final. On her way to her car she was attacked and raped in the parking lot. She was badly injured both physically, mentally and emotionally. She couldn't even leave the house for the trial and her attacker went free. Two years later she still lived with her parents in an apartment which she never left. Her friends came to see her there, her boyfriend does the same. She doesn't watch the news, read the paper or go on social media or online. She had heard her parents and brother talking about losing their apartment due to being broke. Her medical Bills had bled them dry, they had to move to her grandparents house in the city and they were concerned about Nikki and Abbie being able to cope. The family has to deal with Nikki and Abbie's coping skills, Nikki's rapist is released from prison and comes to find her to make amends since he was addicted to meth at the time and he's in recovery. They also have strange disturbances outside, then inside. When Nikki doesn't accept his apology he calls his dad, brother and friends to kill her.
#my writing#my words#horror story#short story#writers on tumblr#twd fanfiction#twd smut#spn fanfic#spn smut#dean x y/n#dean winchester#daryl dixion imagine#daryl x reader#spnfamily#sam x reader#sam winchester#castiel fanfiction
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how’d u get into writing? like, writing fic and being part of the silm community, being Known, that stuff? i’m really new to being a silm cc and i’d love to know ur advice! also: how’d u build up the confidence to start posting meta/hcs? bc i have a Lot of hcs and meta ideas but also i’m really anxious abt posting them bc yknow anxiety is like that
these are some great questions, anon! I’m gonna go through them one by one :)
how’d u get into writing?
not to be like, super cliche, but I’ve...kind of always been a writer? as long as I can remember I’ve been telling stories, and when I was too young to read or write I would dictate them to my mom, who would type them up for me and help me choose clipart illustrations to accompany them. when I got old enough I would always be writing; I attempted my first novel at age 9, and while that never really went anywhere I did finish the darn thing and it had some pretty sophisticated plot twists for a 9-year-old!
like, writing fic
around the same time I got into fandom! I was deep into Warrior cats (like. really deep) and I believe I started writing my first fics when I was like? 10 or 11? my memory is kind of fuzzy on the order of things, but I know I got an account on the Warriors forums when I was 9, and that I was already posting my fic there when I made my FFN account. I believe I was 12 when that happened, but who knows. I haven’t the faintest idea of what happened with those forums, but uhhh pretty much all of my Warriors fic is still up on FFN lmao. you could probably find that if you want to but um...maybe don’t?
my first Big Fic was a self-insert of...my entire 5th/6th grade class into the then-current timeline of the Warriors books...well. I honestly think that might still be my most popular fic of all time l m a o though I try not to think about it because Hashtag Cringe. though as much as I look back on that time with a “yikes,” I am very grateful for the Warriors fandom in a way? that place was so accepting and encouraging of OCs, of AUs, of completely disregarding canon, of worldbuilding that is completely alien from canon - it was a fantastic sandbox to begin with, there were so many ways to write stories and practically all of them were accepted and had fellow fans invested in them!
and being part of the silm community,
soooo I wrote Warriors fic until my freshman year of high school (wow sdjfhkdsjfh), which was when BOTFA came out, and I was absolutely wrecked by the ending and immediately started writing my own fixit fic. I was also super hooked on Kiliel! so that was my intro to the Tolkien fandom; and simultaneously, I joined tumblr, and, well, the rest is history tbh.
I honestly do not remember when I first read the Silm, but I kind of got into the more obscure parts of the Tolkien fandom through fandom osmosis, and I do have a vague memory of doodling the Finwean family tree in geometry class so it might have been later on in freshman year? that was also the same time I was having my Queer Awakening, and Russingon definitely contributed to me unlearning my internalized queerphobia, so probably around then.
anyway - queer awakening, tumblr, Tolkien, transitioning from FFN to AO3 - all of that was happening around the same time. I know I dipped my toes in the Silm fandom then, but I was still primarily a Hobbit fic writer focusing on Kiliel. toward the end of high school I kind of shifted to LOTR and (qp) Gigolas...but somehow the Silm fandom is the most active of the Big Three within the Tolkien fandom, and I was getting dragged further and further in.
it wasn’t until @backtomiddleearthmonth 2019, my freshman year of college, that I really dove into writing Silm fic! I picked some Silm-specific bingo cards and never looked back :D that was really not all that long ago but I am obsessed in a way I don’t really remember being even with TH/LOTR, I obviously cannot see the future but I anticipate hanging out here for a long time. the Silm fandom is great overall and there’s just so much material to work with!! <3
being Known, that stuff?
so I don’t really have a whole lot of context on how “well known” I am in the fandom?? definitely within the past year and a half or so I’ve noticed that I like, get asks like this, and get a significant amount of notes on my posts, and I’ve made a lot of fandom friends especially since I joined some Silm servers on Discord (hmu if you want invites; I’m on the SWG server and 2 general Silm servers and the Russingon server) this past year. and I have 3,000 followers as of this month - and while ever since I hit 1k I don’t particularly pay attention to my follower count I can definitely say that I have more engagement now than I used to! but it took me a long time to build this “audience,” I suppose; I’ve been around the Tolkien fandom since late 2014, so nearly 6 years of this, lol.
really the best way to build a following, in my experience, is to just post a lot of stuff. when I started making edits I got a lot more engagement, because for a long time I would post one every day! (I made them in batches and queued them; I didn’t actually make one every day lol...and now I’m too busy to do that, so I just make edits for events and whenever I feel like it) And I have [checks ao3] 145 works in the Silm fandom as of today - I’m fairly prolific! I’ve come to generally expect 3-10 comments on most of my oneshots, which is a lot more than I used to have back in the day. consistency and quantity are more likely to attract people to your work - and quality, of course.
also: how’d u build up the confidence to start posting meta/hcs?
I’ve been writing since I was very young, and I’ve been writing fic for like...11 years? I think? in that time I’ve produced a lot of garbage, but imo most of that was in my Warrior cats phase, so I came into the Tolkien fandom with confidence in myself and my writing. I’m also working on original fiction on the side (I hope to eventually become a published fantasy author, but right now school takes up most of my time that I don’t devote to fandom, which gives me more immediate gratification and also is just Very Fun) and I know I’m a good writer.
basically, I’ve been doing this for like...half my life, and I’m still fairly young, so I’ve had time to build up my skill and confidence and I know I’m only going to get better with time. you will get better with practice. like I said, I’ve written a lot of terrible stuff, and it’s only through sucking for a long time that I’ve gotten to the point I am now. and I am far from perfect; I know I still have lots of room to grow!
for meta and headcanons specifically, I started with writing fic, and then when I didn’t think I could stretch something into an entire fic I would just make a hc post. I have a vivid memory of writing my first meta in a notebook during driver’s ed because it was so goddamn boring and I had Thoughts about Tauriel and Thranduil!
in my experience, meta comes from having Opinions and wanting to share them and most importantly to back them up - you need to have sources! you need to have reasons! you need to have justification! otherwise it’s not meta, it’s a headcanon or an AU. which is fine!! I love hc/AU!!! but they are not the same as meta, and I’m a stickler for being accurate when it comes to meta. if you have sources and shit to back you up, that will help you build the confidence to share your meta.
sharing disinformation and passing it off as meta instead of just coming out and saying this is a headcanon/baseless theory/AU or whatever is such a fandom pet peeve of mine; it’s not bad for something to not be Accurate! you just have to have that disclaimer - and even when you’re writing meta, you’re offering an interpretation of the text, and you need to acknowledge that other interpretations also exist and are valid.
um. I hope this answers your questions? and sorry for basically word-vomiting my entire life story, lol. this post got long; the main reason I’ve written so much fic is because I really just cannot shut up for the life of me. sooo if you can tear of that filter of being shy and just. say shit. you can go so far~!
OH and one more thing - I can’t believe I almost forgot this - but part of being a writer is participating in the community. this is code for LEAVE A DAMN COMMENT IF YOU LIKE A FIC. that’s how I made most of my fandom friends before Discord! I follow @ao3feed-silmarillion and stalk that blog for new Silm fics; I read the ones that interest me and comment on them.
I know this is not really the most common way for folks to find fic but it’s so rewarding to interact with new fic, new writers, new commentors, new stories - you can find gems that don’t rise to the top of the kudos/bookmark lists; you become friends with your fellow writers; you can watch people grow and change; you support smaller content creators. yeah, you might not be getting Just The Best Stuff, but it’s so so so worth it!!
and if you make friends in the comment section of other people’s fic - I guarantee you some of them will go to your AO3 profile and check out your fic, too! and they’ll leave comments! this is a fic community, and that’s what I cherish about fandom most of all, tbh.
anyway - again - sorry for rambling so much, but I hoped this helped! feel free to send in another ask, or to come talk to me off anon if you’d like! and definitely send me your stuff if/when you decide to share it; I would love to support you!!! <3
#silm#silm fandom#silmarillion#fan culture#tmi anna#(for real this time sjdfhdkfh)#tefain nin#long post#anon#answers
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GO Rom Com Spotlight: @bilboo
The lovely @bilboo (also perkynurples on AO3) has claimed The Vow to adapt for Good Omens in the Good Omens Rom Com Event.
For reference, here’s a little background about the source material!
About The Vow: Paige (Rachel McAdams) and Leo (Channing Tatum) are happily married newlyweds, but their idyllic life together suddenly shatters when a car accident leaves her in a coma. When Paige awakes, she has severe memory loss and doesn't know Leo. She also has a confusing relationship with her parents (Sam Neill, Jessica Lange) and still harbors feelings for a former fiance (Scott Speedman). Despite these difficult obstacles, Leo is determined to renew their bond and rebuild their marriage.
We spent some time chatting about how the adaptation is coming so far, as well as future plans for it! Now, get to know @bilboo a little better!
* * *
goromcom: Beginning with a bit about you, or at least, what Tumblr thinks it knows about you. Tumblr says you post “about #thorin and #ovw". I do indeed enjoy discovering what other fandoms the romcom participants enjoy. What if I made you choose only one of Good Omens, The Hobbit/LotR, and Overwatch? (What an evil question that is!)
bilboo: One might think that’s a difficult question, but compared to a lifelong obsession with everything Tolkien, Overwatch was only a short foray into a different fandom. I’ve been reading Tolkien all my life, and same goes for Terry Pratchett’s Discworld, which is how I came across Good Omens many years ago, of course. I choose Tolkien without a moment’s hesitation, because it’s transformed from the stories my father read to me and my brother at bedtime, into this hugely inspirational experience which has helped me become a better writer, and meet many amazing people. The Good Omens fandom feels like visiting a familiar place after a long absence, in a way :)
goromcom: I had an early bonding moment with the person I went on to marry over the fact that I recognized an obscure Tolkien quote in his email signature, so I understand. :)
But on to your romcom! You chose to adapt The Vow. Has this movie been a favorite of yours, or is there some other reason you chose it?
bilboo: Funny story actually, I came to this event a bit late, and I was browsing the stories still available to be claimed, and I didn’t even recognize The Vow at first - clicked on it and realized, hey! I’ve seen this before! And it has an amnesia storyline, of course I need to adapt this. Cue me rewatching it half a dozen times and coming up with a Good Omens adaptation :)
goromcom: I love that! What's your favorite moment of your movie, and are you looking forward to presenting it in your adaptation? Any loose plans for that scene that you can share?
bilboo: I absolutely adore the scene where Leo takes Paige on their first date - all over again. He’s so adorable, but there’s this undercurrent of heartbreak - he tries so hard throughout the entire movie to just make her happy, hoping but at the same time daring not to hope too much that she will remember him, and it really shines in this one scene. He wants Paige to fall in love with him all over again, and I think in a way, the same is happening to him.
goromcom: Aww, it sounds sweet. Other than that, do you plan to stick very closely to the beats of the original story, or make bigger changes?
bilboo: It’s definitely going to stick to the main beats of the original in that it will be a modern human AU, but other than that, my adaptation will be a little bit more… subdued, I suppose you could say. Not too many big family gatherings, a lot more introspection. Aziraphale takes Paige’s role, and he doesn’t have an art studio, but rather a familiar cozy bookshop. :) Crowley still owns a recording studio, because I thought that would be perfect for him as a music lover.
goromcom: What's an interesting decision you've made in your planning so far--a notable casting decision, a changing of venue, or some other plan you have to paint Good Omens all over your rom com?
bilboo: Working off the last question before this one, some changes do occur to involve the many-splendored list of characters from Good Omens in this fic. I’m kind of looking forward to writing Beelzebub as Crowley’s close friend, instead of their usual villainous role, and on the other hand, Gabriel will take the part of Aziraphale’s very questionable ex-boss (and perhaps ex-more). The amnesia storyline really speaks to me, and without spoiling anything, I love that the original movie didn’t take the easy, cheesy way out in the end. I mean to implement that as well.
goromcom: Interesting! But let’s not give too much away and move on to the final question, which I am blatantly stealing from The Good Place: The Podcast. Tell me something "good". It can be something big or small. It can be a charity you think is doing good work, or you can talk about how great your pet is.
bilboo: I’ve been seeing lots of pictures of people’s pets in these interviews, and I adore that. My pets are a bit unusual, because they’re actually a hive of thousands of bees - I became a beekeeper just last year, and I was very anxious for them to survive the winter, which I’m happy to report they DID, and I can’t wait to watch them grow, and actually harvest my own honey this year!
goromcom: That’s amazing! What a lovely, constructive hobby! :)
Speaking of lovely, it’s just a short wait until the lovely GO adaptation of The Vow will begin posting! Stay tuned.
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