i am utterly in love with miriel.

Beautiful and heartbreaking.

There is plot here, of course, but the characterizations are really what set this piece apart. All the characters, even the loathsome Karbû, are carefully etched, easily recognizable. Sauron chilled me, from his slither of dialogue, to his play on names, to his veiled insults. And I never would have thought an ingenue character would hold my interest beyond a paragraph or two, but Zaira did. Of course, I can't say enough about the nobility of Elendil, either. However, despite all these stellar examples of characterization, Miriel is the centerpiece in this story. Italicized inner thoughts show her soul within the shell, her necessary facade, and her deep and hopeless desire for a different life. If she became a little bitter there at the end, I can't really blame her for it. In fact, I can only admire her and thank Elendil for giving her that poetic end in the telling. She deserved it.[Oh, and looky: another story that I've always admired and have never bothered to leave a review for. Well, at least the MEFAs encouraged me to write out some of the glowing feedback that had been in my head for a while. ]

I really don't know what to say. This is wonderful. I want to cry now.

Thankyou so much for writing this. Now i feel a little recompense for the death of tar-Miriel. It always hurt me, the sheer cruelty and condenscention of the Valar.

That was wonderful! I always wanted to hear more about Tar-Miriel. :)

Wonderful work!

That was one of the best Tolkien fanfictions I have ever read! I love all the stories concerning Númenor but there are very few around! You captured Míriel's and Zaira's feelings beautifully and it was well thought out and described. Excellent work! :)

An excellent story... and true to Tolkien, too... Poor Tar-Miriel, so noble, holding duty above everything... let me just disregard second to last sentence, OK? *bows*

Oh, that was... incredible, truly. A fantastic piece of work. Few stories were written of the Akallabeth, and few stories have ever been so sincere and touching. Dear Miriel! I pity her so. Thus end the best of them. We may know there was hope - if indeed there was hope - but it is so easy and so painful to understand that she did not.

No hope for her...

Beautiful.

And, because I must - Adunaic? Wow!