2005 Author Reviews for
Lamiel

Lamiel is one of those authors who can work with large groups of people and yet focus on one or two characters without ever giving the impression that the rest of the group has been left behind. I would dearly love to know how this is pulled off, but in any case, it happens again in "Best Laid Plans." The focus seems to be primarily Legolas and Gimli, but Aragorn, Bergil, and the hobbits receive plenty of screen time. And in addition to being able to work with large groups of people, Lamiel is also able to work with large groups of plot elements. By the end of the story, everything has wrapped itself up neatly until it's one entertwining tapestry. Very tight writing and great tone to the narrative to add that extra punch of humor.

I think one of Lamiel's best achievements in this story is pacing. That includes pacing of the narrative as well as pacing of plot developments, in particular the formation of a friendship between Legolas and Gimli. The way these things play off one another, adding tension here or a semblence of peace there, is remarkable, and Lamiel's ability to balance everything that goes on, both with Moria and with a certain elf and dwarf, is nothing short of amazing. It doesn't hurt that characterization is also fantastic.

MEFAs introduced me to Lamiel's work, and I'm quite grateful for that. Lamiel is one of those authors who works well with an ensemble of characters?whether in her humorous story of a surprise begetting day party for Legolas or in her fantastically crafted drama, "In the Deep Places", which traces the evolution of Legolas and Gimli towards friendship, her characters move in a fully peopled world. It gives her writing a depth and breadth that is missed in more narrowly focused stories. Friendship is one of the great themes of Lord of the Rings, and certainly one of the more evident examples of it is the Legolas-Gimli relationship. Lamiel does justice to all the characters involved, avoiding both sentimentality and exaggerated, hyperbolic confrontations, which seems realistic to me given the context in which Legolas and Gimli get to know each other. She clearly isn't daunted by the prospect of dealing with complex emotions and relations, and she puts the characters through their emotional paces, allowing a full spectrum of feeling to show and influence the unfolding of the drama. In so doing, she breathes life into the Fellowship, and into the unillumined spaces between the lines of Tolkien's text. Well done, Lamiel!