As i read this, the only thing i can think of is how awful would it be for this girl to get giradia and spend weeks spewing frothy green from both ends lmao. Note to readers: Don't drink river water if you can help it.

What a journey! I started reading this when the early chapters were being published and decided to come back to it later so I could binge it when it was complete. I enjoyed the attempted realism and highs and lows of Maddie's adventures. It did make me wonder about the how's and why's too, like Maddie, and ponder if there could ever be any iteration of modern person falls into middle earth that could make any kind of sense beyond fan service. Either way, Thank you for sharing your ideas with us!

Magic is a convenient cop-out to why she didn’t remember freaking Rivendell and Elves But ok. We’ll go with that for now.

What’s sad is if he taught her how to thoroughly salt meat, that means they had a bag of salt with them. She could have put salt in the boiled water and used that to disinfect his wound. I don’t blame her for not knowing though. It’s not like she’s a nurse or anything. But when she noticed his wound was swollen, she could have saved his life by reopening the wound with a hot knife and draining the fluid and pus out. His body would have had an easier time fighting the infection. Oh well.

As I thought more about the matter, I think that’s why it actually MIGHT be more realistic when authors make their OC’s a little more equipped or knowledgeable (or able to magically speak the language) because, let’s be honest, for a girl to “fall into Middle Earth” it wouldn’t be realistic if there wasn’t some sort of divine intervention. A normal random girl can’t just accidentally fall into a fictional world. There would be a purpose to it…such as a lesson that needed to be learned or an inner growth to be achieved. To take fate or God or destiny out of it makes the whole thing unrealistic, since scientifically it’s about as sound as falling into a cartoon show It doesn’t happen. And if it did, it wouldn’t be an accident.

What’s hilarious is that the TREES seem familiar to her…but the name Orcs doesn’t? At this point, this story is becoming a comedy to me. She has all these days of traveling and thinking on her hands, she doesn’t make the connection with all that time on her hands to simply walk and think? I mean….who in the U.S, hasn’t seen their ugly action figures in the toy section at Walmart? Get real, here. I love Lord of the Rings and I’m very well-versed in it…..but the trees would not be something familiar to me. Even now, trying to imagine the Lothlorian trees right now doesn’t call anything special to my mind. In fact, the trees in the movie were very silvery because of the strange elf lights and it wasn’t Autumn. So to say they seemed “familiar”, when “Orcs” didn’t immediately bring ugly misshapen faces to her mind is hilarious. At this point, she’ll probably see Galadriel and think “Ooooh! Pretty lady! She seems so familiar!” when literally anyone else (even if they aren’t familiar with Middle Earth) would be like “Oh wow! She reminds me of that one elf lady from that movie I saw once! What was the name of that movie? Lord of something? I don’t remember. It had a guy holding a ring in it on the poster, or something.”

Ok, out of all your chapters this one is only UNREALISTIC one so far. If all these different places sound familiar to her, like “Bree” and “Rivendell” sound familiar to her and she then meets and ELF and lives with ELVES ….it is very unrealistic that she wouldn’t AT LEAST think “Woah….this reminds me of Lord of the Rings! Obviously it’s not possible, but still that’s a crazy coincidence!”
But no. Nothing. Not even an inkling

Why is that unrealistic, you might wonder? Because 90% of what modern people with tv’s know about Elves LITERALLY comes from the Lord of the Rings franchise…..but what’s worse than that is that she doesn’t even blink when she hears the name Bilbo Baggins. Like, is it because it’s a different name in English and it doesn’t sound like Bilbo Baggins? The hairy feet don’t clue her in? Like, “Oh my gosh….if Elves exist then these small halflings with hairy feet remind me of hobbits!….Nah.I must be imagining it. It’s just a strange genetic thing. But….Rivendell and now Hobbits? This must be…..but no, it can’t be.” Like, denial at this point would be more realistic than her ignorance This chapter made everyone think she might be a simpleton who can barely make Mac n’ Cheese without her mom holding her hand. Dumber than rocks.

Let’s even try to give her the benefit of the doubt in this situation, ok? Like, let’s say that she wasn’t very knowledgeable about Middle Earth, right? And maybe she might have seen the trailer for the movie, or recognizes a few of the characters because of how popular the whole thing is (it’s kind of like not knowing what Harry Potter is. Even if you’ve never seen Harry Potter you know OF Harry Potter and some of the characters because you see their faces in ads, and posters, and etc.) and she might know of a few locations in Middle Earth from snippets of conversation she overhears from fans of the show…..
Even if we gave her the benefit of the doubt, it doesn’t work. Because for someone to recognize “Bree” (which is a name not used often in the movie or books) and “Rivendell” (which is used more often than Bree) but NOT “the Shire” (which is literally THE most spoken of place in Middle Earth besides Mordor) is the most unrealistic thing you could possibly do here. I’m deeply annoyed and frustrated by just HOW LITTLE that makes sense. Because the fact is that it doesn’t. It doesn’t make sense. The Shire is talked about more than any other place in Middle Earth because it’s where the stories begin and end. The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings both start and end in the Shire, and it’s talked about multiple times by the character throughout the story because of how much they miss home, lol. To not recognize when a short guy with hairy feet says “The Shire”, it’s absolutely insane and unrealistic.
The only way you could POSSIBLY redeem this story in my eyes is if “The Shire” went by a different name in Westron. But that wouldnt make sense because “Fornost” is in Westron as well as “Rivendell”, and “Bree”. So logically that means that “Shire” is Westron too.

You done messed up A-Aron!

It’s been 4 chapters and I’ve wanted to comment on every sing one, but I’ve also been anxious to get to the next chapter and see what happens lol. I just want you to know that this story is wonderful! It FEELS real, which is sooo frustrating haha! If anyone of us were suddenly transported to Middle Earth this is EXACTLY how it would be, lol.

I've read this twice, and I'll happily read it again. This fanfic is like a breath of fresh air, a warm hug, the comfort of home.

I loved this story so much! I tore through it within three days and really enjoyed it a lot. thank you for writing this!

I cannot begin to tell you how wonderful I found this story to be! I love how you wrote it, and I really felt like it made perfect sense the whole way through. The language barrier and struggle to just survive in a world where nothing is what you are familiar with all felt natural and flowed in a way one could easily expect to actually happen. I binged this in two days just because it was so good. I hope to read more of your work!

"a large room with a handsome desk littered with scros and books"
this is my first time reading about a desk being describe as handsome

Thank you for this story. It was so lively. you did an amazing job at what your attempt of a girl being in middle earth may realistically be like while keeping it entertaining. Even to the end it was an amazing read.

That was a great read. Loved it. Well done.
As you said in the beginning it truly was difficult to find a good LotRs story when you started writing this. Particularly in the Harry Potter/LotRs crossovers, where Harry suddenly flips his preferences to men (?), unless it's a fem!Harry that enters middle earth, but, I have read some good stories of fem!Harry.
I have found a few good stories since coming back to fan-fic reading, including this one.
I can't tell you how many times I've read the LotRs and Harry Potter books, including a few other series' of books, maybe a dozen. LotRs will always be my favourite, Including The Hobbit and The Silmarillion. I've always started with it. Tolkien built such a great world.
Thank you for such a great story and uploading it to the world.

Wow! This was so beautifully written and I cannot wait to re-read this wonderful work! As soon as I picked it up I could t put it down until it was fully read.

This was such a wonderful, wonderful story. I enjoyed every moment of it, and I wish Maddie all the best :-) I really love the ending (even though it sounds more like the beginning).
This story made me happy! Thank you for bringing Boromir back :-)
Thank you for this amazing story!