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Anérea has requested the following types of constructive criticism on this fanwork: Characterization, Conflict, Description/Imagery, Mood/Tone, Organization/Structure, Pacing, Plot, Point of View, Research, Sensitivity Read, Setting, Spelling, Grammar, and Mechanics, Style, Worldbuilding. All constructive criticism must follow our diplomacy guidelines.

I love the lines you drew here from your human OC/Maia OC characters all the way to Earendil and Elwing. It's hard to appreciate the amount of time the events of the First Age take since it's so focused on elves, but the number of human generations from the rising of the sun really puts it into perspective.  I also love how this cute exchange of wisdom between mother and daughter is set amid a moment of consequence for the Edain.

Thank you for your lovely comment!

And I'm pleased you like the connections that run all the way through. (Tolkien ensured that worked out nicely for me: when I wrote the earlier fic featuring Fraiwen’s parents, I had just looked at Adanel's descendants to Elwing, but later I realised it was her brother's line that led to Eärendil. And the mathematics worked perfectly, for a change!)

This is really lovely! You've packed a lot of great and fascinating worldbuilding into a small moment between mother and daughter, and I really love the imagery of Adanel and the flowers and the light!

I think these early generations of Men are so interesting!  From canon, we only get tantalizing hints of what their own traditions were, before they entered Beleriand and what those first encounters with the Noldor and Sindar looked like from their point of view.

So I think it's great that you are focussing on that and on Zimrahin and Adanel in particular, who I always wanted to know more about. I really like how you show their relationship and how it emerges that Adanel's knowledge of earlier traditions is passed on to her from Zimrahin.

The scene setting is lovely and I think you have integrated the more general message very well into the conversation and the story-telling.

You are also whetting my curiosity for what other tales may be to come, as I gather there is a whole family history here that doesn't just exist as backstory!

Thank you, I'm delighted that you appreciated this piece.

The blank in-between possibility-spaces are one of the magical things I love about Tolkien's work. I didn't expect to find myself writing about 'early man', but now I'm here I'm finding it both fun and fascinating. I wanted to know more about the darkness that Andreth mentions, what form it took and how they overcame it, hence the connection to Adanel. And suddenly her mother was there, a quietly powerful wise woman herself, bridging the generations. So oh yes! There is a whole chain of ancestors who are clamouring for their thoughts and experiences to be cast into words.