The beginning of the first review in this set was inadvertently cut
off. Sorry, Juno!
Title: Tamer's Tale · Author: juno_magic · Races: Cross-Cultural · ID:
41
Reviewer: Dwimordene · 2007-07-09 01:15:49
I've seen a very few stories that attempt to give Gandalf a romantic
interest. They are usually well-written, and I can see how it might
happen, but there's an essential something that's missing intuition,
I guess, whatever it is that makes you go, "Aha, so that's how it
works!" Juno's story supplies me with that "Aha!" moment.
Juno's writing is strong, and features her usual story-within-a-story
frame, the narrator speaking directly to the reader to frame the
locale, the history, put the question in the reader's mind, invite the
reader in. And then she switches to her primary character, who tells
the rest Juno has that enviable gift of telling a fully lived out
life in just a few words. She doesn't need many, for all are well
chosen. One gets a strong sense of the isolation of Himling, of its
being a waymarker, a boundary stone (not just having one) it stands
on the borders between myth and reality, permanently linked to
legendary Himring, between one world and the next. It is a place where
a wizard does not simply come, but in some way dwells, on the border of
any map of Middle-earth, forgotten and forgetting, and imbued with its
own curious remembrances.
Tamer's acceptance of her place in the life of this tiny society, and
her devotion to her master, the Grey Wizard who occasionally comes for
a respite from carrying the rest of the world's burdens on his
shoulders, is well-portrayed. We watch her fall in love in a way that
makes sense in the context of her life, and requires no questions nor
any extraneous declarations of love or the sorts of courtly romantic
episodes one often sees deployed in romance stories.
Gandalf's reactions, too, make sense, and I love the ending the way
in which Gandalf has to sacrifice something for a love he will never be
able to settle into. Juno gives an explanation in author's notes of
what is at stake, and what this episode in his life could mean in terms
of canonical events, but really, it isn't needed. The story makes sense
on its own terms, and I think the thing that cements it for me is that
Gandalf does not fall in love with someone who is like him, or with
someone who is classically beautiful, or one of the Eldar in some
sense, they are too much akin. Gandalf is attracted and bound
eventually to that which is different from him he goes out of himself
quite literally here, becoming something that no other of his kind has
been save, perhaps, Melian. And so he is able to understand, not just
know, human love and human grief in a way that no other Istari ever
shall.
Beautiful story, Juno, and beautifully told. I'd recommend this to any
Tolkien fan.