Strength & Beauty Challenge Stories and Art

[dawn_felagund]

Yesterday our Strength and Beauty challenge closed with eighteen stories and works of art contributed! Below is a list of all of the challenge entries for Strength and Beauty. All links to stories go the Table of Contents, where you can view ratings, warnings, author's notes, and additional information about the story. If you like a piece, please consider letting the author or artist know by leaving a comment.

Artanis to Alatiriel: Earweniel's Homecoming by Kaylee Arafinwiel. Written for B2MEM 2017 and the March Strength and Beauty challenge: loosely linked tales of Galadriel's welcome in Alqualonde at the end of the Third Age. Idril remembers, as she walks on the shore of Alqualonde. Some time after Idril greeted Galadriel at the quay (see "Itarilde and Tani"), they, Elwing, and Nimloth get together for a good catch-up. They don't intend to run into Galadriel's uncles (and aunt) at the tavern...Lindar s the term the Teleri use for themselves.

A Cloak of Magic by LadyBrooke. Thuringwethil was once an elf, and perhaps she will be again.

The Elf at the Bottom of the Garden by Himring. Could Amras, son of Feanor, and Haldar, Haleth's brother, have met?
I think they could--well, in my 'verse, at any rate. Another glimpse of the early history of the Haladin, also featuring a very young Haleth. Written both for the "Strength and Beauty" challenge at SWG and for the Ambarussa day of Feanorian Week (Tumblr), although it features only Amras.

Feanor Never Planned to Fall in Love by Erulisse. I made an original artwork from charcoal and pastels for 2014's B2MeM. It was entitled "Feanor Never Planned to Fall in Love". Now, three years later, I have developed the story behind that picture. Here's the full effort - Feanor Never Planned to Fall in Love in illustration and text.

A Garden of Plots by LadyBrooke. Nimloth is reborn, builds her own house, and starts a garden.

The Golden Dancer by Lyra. Fëanor first sees Indis as she practices a traditional Vanyarin spear-dance. Fascination turns into life-long antipathy. Inspired by the B2MeM prompt, "when he first stood near her and recognized her dimly through the shadows, like one who, at the beginning of the month, either sees or thinks he has seen the moon rise through clouds." ~Vergil, The Aenid

'the hidden paths' by hennethgalad. Orodreth and Curufin in Nargothrond.

In Arda Fair by Tyelca. Two brothers and their thoughts about Arda.

In Wisdom by just_jenni. Melian wrestles with her feelings about Elu Thingol and laments some of her decisions concerning the Doom that befell them.

A Light in the Heart by NelyafinweFeanorion. Written for Feanorian Week 2017. Day 1: Maedhros: A view of Maedhros, just after the rescue from Thangorodrim. Fingon's perpective.

Molten Copper by Fernstrike. This is artwork and an accompanying drabble. It's for both the SWG March 2017 Challenge and for Fëanorian Week :-)

Noldolantë – Maglor’s Lament by oshun. This is an micro-essay and a banner created as an extended introduction to a fic-rec list pulled together to celebrate Maglor’s Day on the Fëanorian Week celebration on Tumblr and initially inspired by the SWG Strength and Beauty March 2017 challenge.

One day in Doriath: Strength and Beauty by hennethgalad. the relationship between Celeborn and Thranduil, the engagement of Celeborn and Galadriel.

She walks in Beauty by lindahoyland. Varda has not forgotten Middle-earth.

Still by LadyBrooke. Findekáno thinks Maitimo is beautiful, through life and into death, though not always how others think of it. 7 connected drabbles.

Strength Bestows Beauty by oshun. SWG March 2017 Strength and Beauty Challenge, B2MeM 2017 (blue path/artwork/secondary colors/Tolkien quote), Fëanorian Week Tumblr 2017 - Day 1- Maedhros - > Adjusting/Coping, Beauty

That Blow to Your Leg by LadyBrooke. Caranthir does not trust easily and does not love easily, but Haleth told him in a different world they would be perfect. 7 related drabbles.

Things of Beauty by LadyBrooke. Thingol bargains for a necklace, the dwarves make a crown to scare dragons, and Narvi decides to make up for Celebrimbor's failings. Three linked drabbles.

---

A few housekeeping details ...

I want to once again recognize and thank from the bottom of my heart oloriel, whose efforts on behalf of our new challenges--particularly in making the beautiful stamps that we use to reward creators and reviewers--has been such a huge help to me these past two months.

The new challenge will be announced on the 15th, which is Saturday. I will also update stamp collections this weekend. If your collection is incorrect on Monday the 17th, please drop me a line at moderator@silmarillionwritersguild.org (or leave me a comment here), and I will correct it.

Late challenge entries are welcome but do not receive stamps. However, review challenges never expire! And Lyra made lots of beautiful reviewer stamps this month, just sayin' ... please go show our creators some love and, if you like their work, let them know!

Comments

[lindahoyland.livejournal.com]

May I ask how do the stamps work and where do you get one? Is it the banner at the top of this post?

[hhimring]

Dawn will let you know--but in the meantime--no, it's not the banner.
If you want to get a general impression of what the challenge stamps look like, have a look at my profile on the SWG Archive. I've got stamps from the previous challenges there.

[lindahoyland.livejournal.com]

Thank you. You have a wonderful banner collection.

[dawn_felagund]

As Himring suggested, the best way to get an idea about the stamp collections is to look at one. Here is Himring's. We offer stamps for creators and reviewers for each challenge. Creator stamps are only available during the window when the challenge is active (the 15th of the month through the 10th of the next month), but the reviewer challenges never expire.

I will email you this weekend when your stamp collection is uploaded and ready to go. You will have access to the image and also the HTML code needed to make the image map: hovering over a stamp tells you what it was earned for, and clicking it takes you to the fanwork it was earned for (or the whole challenge collection for reviewer stamps). I will also put your stamp collection on your profile. I will update it monthly, after each challenge ends, for any new creator and reviewer stamps earned. (I try to update the reviewer stamps as well during the month, but at the least, I do updates the weekend after a challenge ends.)

[lindahoyland.livejournal.com]

Thank you so much. It was fun to take part in the challenge.

[mithrial.livejournal.com]

I read 'A Cloak of Magic' by LadyBrooke, but couldn't comment. Then I realised I hadn't set up my account on the SWG yet.
I've set it up now, and know I'll enjoy reading some more of these fic while I wait for account approval.

[dawn_felagund]

I'm at work and will send the official welcome email once I'm home but your account is unlocked and ready to use! :)

[mithrial.livejournal.com]

Thank you Dawn. I certainly didn't expect you to dash off and let me in.

I'm just happy to be able to come and have some reading time over the weekend.

*hugs* Tia

[dawn_felagund]

No worries! I really try not to let people I know (and don't have to look into whether they are a real person or a spammer) languish in "locked" status for too long. I wish we didn't have to default new accounts to locked status at all, but the damage done by spambots to our site makes it a necessary evil.

And I never sent the official welcome email! Gah! Seems kind of silly to do so now, but please let me know if you have any issues logging in, using the site, etc. *hugs back*

[mithrial.livejournal.com]

Hi Dawn, sorry this is a late reply. I had no problems logging in, thanks.
Just came over to LJ for the first time in a while and realised I'd missed loads of comments in my in-box.

[dawn_felagund]

No worries! As a site admin, I always go with no news being good news. :)

[mithrial.livejournal.com]

:)

[ladybrooke]

Hi! A late welcome to the SWG, and I'm glad you read one of my fics. :)

[mithrial.livejournal.com]

Hi Brooke,
Just realizing that I've missed a lot of comments on LJ as I'm crossposting from DW mostly now.
Thanks for the welcome.

[ladybrooke]

I just have a quick question - in the April Newsletter it had mentioned Legendarium Ladies April as one of the other challenges running at the same time as the Strength and Beauty challenge in the description of it, but not in the March one, so was there supposed to be a stamp for that?

[dawn_felagund]

LLA was included as part of the "April challenge," but you're right that part of the "March challenge" also overlapped. For stories that used LLA for Strength & Beauty (March), I've noted on my master document that they've earned an LLA stamp, which I'll apply when I go through and do all of the April stamps. I didn't have all of the April stamps set up yet when I did the updates for Strength and Beauty, so those Strength & Beauty entries that also used LLA or Poetry Month, I didn't do those particular updates yet.

Or, to make a long story short: Yes, you will get the LLA stamp for the story you wrote for both LLA and Strength & Beauty. :) The next time I do updates, it will be included.

[ladybrooke]

Thanks for the answer! I wasn't sure if I was missing something obvious, and also am well aware that I am overlapping LLA with everything and thought I might just be confusing myself (everything is not an exaggeration. I mean, I wrote a HP story for a non-Tolkien prompt challenge, kept thinking of it in terms of LLA, and only realized halfway through that wait, what am I doing, this is not Tolkien, I did not need to do this. I love LLA, but I think I broke my brain).

I will wait for next month for my stamp (really, even if you do updates between now and then, you can put mine off until then. I'll probably get busy and forget to look until I am prompted to by another update here, now that I have an answer and won't have a question to remind me. :P).

[dawn_felagund]

You're welcome! It's not an issue I'd thought about until this month, when I noticed a couple of March stories using challenges that we were mentioning in April ... because, of course, overlap months and certainly would sometimes overlap other events even if we managed to keep them contained in a single month! :) But I always err on the side of generosity. I really want to encourage people to look at other challenges rather than making it feel like one has to pick and choose because it's otherwise impossible to fit it all in. (Plus, promoting other Tolkien fandom events is not a bad thing, imo.)

I will update it in the next cycle, although I appreciate the thought, because I try to get as many updates done as possible before the end of the challenge, where there's always a bit of a rush. I am thankful at the end of the challenge for the bits and pieces I get done before then, when I'm not spending six hours on a Saturday catching up a month's worth of recordkeeping, stamping, and file uploads! :)