My favorite parts:

"They are strange elves, all elves can be a bit queer sometimes, but these two are more hasty then is normal for an elf. It's their human blood I've always said. Now don't fret over it anymore.”

"Bilbo was giving Elrond's adviser a strange look,"- Oh snap! You know braiding hair is like 2nd base for an elf ;)

And then after the jokes comes the assault. Gah, didn't see that twist :( Good of her to take charge of the situation at the end.

OMG! GREAT STUFF ! I CANNOT COMPARE TO YOUR WRITING ITS ABSOLUTLY AMAZING AND INTERESTING

Author's Response: Thank u so much, i am humbled! Hope u keep enjoying the story :)

Poor jaden falling for estel... que bad. happy that the twins are being nice and Bilbo is always a delightful addition to any ME story.

Nice to have a bit of a back-story on the hostility of Legolas to Jaden - and so refreshing that Jaden is actually *not* all Silhouette romance over him, but rather over Aragorn.

I like her maturity in deciding to be polite to him rather than huffy and rude, that is, I think, how an adult would behave.

Just one thing. It's Noldor, not Nolder. Noldo (singular) Noldorin, etc.

I'll send you a message about the italics, but please look in your spam folder, as messages from here always go into my spam.

Author's Response: I am faltered you find Jaden mature, that's what I was aiming for. Even though she's only 19, she hasn't had an easily life. Thanks so much for the e-mail! I've gone back and fixed the chapters, and in future they sould be less confusing with her thoughts italicized. I changed it to Noldor too, kind of embarrassing to mess that one up, oh well :)

Hmm... Is this true? Should legolas have black hair? I get so confused trying to follow the family trees of the elves.

Author's Response: I think it's really up to you. Tolkien never actually said what color his hair was. I like dark hair better, and given the amount of blond Legolas's I thought a change would be good. However, he could have just as easily had silver hair. Legolas's father was a Sindar elf and they usually had silver or black hair. Legolas's mother is unknown, so whether she was a wood elf or a Sindar is unknown. I am glad to see you are still reading :)

This is a very interesting idea, and much more thought-provoking than the usual Girl-falls-into-Middle-earth.

I like to explore the other regions of Middle-earth in my stories, and although I work on the premise that many of the people of the Harad and Rhun had the misfortune to come under Morgoth's dominion in the First Age, that to paint them all as evil 'Men of the Darkness' is just too sweeping. Also, Bór and his sons who went into Maedhros and Maglor's service renounced Morgoth and were faithful, and I hope that is not forgotten by the Elves in your work.

I also like that you do not *angelize* the Elves. Jaden's first encounter with them showed them to be very *human* in their reactions and prejudices. Tolkien stated that Elves were human, and his Silmarillion Elves certainly acted *very* human and so I love it when authors write them with a human dimension - although not as Mortals, since I think the mind-set of a person who lived so long would be utterly different to a Mortals.

I don't think any-one has attempted writing of a black/asian etc person as a main protagonist in a Middle-earth story. I always see Arda as a place of exotic, rich and fascinating cultures stretching from the far south to the distant east as well as the north, and it's good to see how some-one of a different skin-color to the norm in the north would be treated, given the agelong prejudices.

I would suggest putting Jaden's thoughts in italics like I better not faint, she thought distractedly. Oh my God, this can't really be happening, though...
as it makes it stand out better. There are also a few words you should read over, like hand jesters is gesture - it's there turn their turn. Just a few, which are easily fixed; you can edit online, I am always picking with mine.

Take care

Siân

Author's Response: Thank you for taking the time to read my story, and reviewing :) I admit I had forgotten about Bor, and it's good to know there were at least a few good portrayals of dark skinned human's in Middle Earth. I will have to think about how this will affect my elves reactions to Jaden. Elves have long memories, and are slow to forget past kindnesses rendered, as well as evil done to them. Perhaps I have been to general with their immediate mistrust of her as a human with dark skin. However, I also think the elves would be slow to forget the fact that many humans, both light and dark fought on the side of Morgoth, as well as Sauron in past wars. I see that I will have to give it further thought. I don't want to misrepresent elves, but as you said they are not perfect beings, and can make mistakes, which is something I'd like to explore later on in the story. Thank you for your helpful hints on grammar and spelling, I will make the changes :) I hope you will continue reading. I really appreciate your comments.

Oh, I'm so happy to see this here too! Now I can leave a review. I'm enjoying this story a great deal. I would recommend, maybe, a beta. There are some wrong word choices. I need to know if you're going to be nice to Erestor? Please? Keep up the great work.

Author's Response: I am glade you're enjoying it! I'll think about a beta too, I know grammar and word choice isn't my strength. Don't worry, I am a huge Erestor fan too, I'll be supper nice to him :)

I like what you have so far and I am ReALLY excited to see you explore racial identity and prejudice in Middle-Earth. I'm writing a story (A Vampire Slayer in Middle Earth) where the protag is Latina and i struggled to figure out how or if that should be addressed regarding how the elves and rangers would treat her. I got so caught up with other things I didn't incorporate those thoughts into my story so I am interested to see how you handle it. Nice to have some background on Kenya too.

Author's Response: I'll have to check out your story. I've always thought there weren't enough non-white OC's out there. I have always wished Tolkien could have made at least ONE of his good character's black, but he was a product of his time I guess.