Possible Sequels...

[Galadriel55]

Welcome, Herenya! It's always good to see new people here, and have new ideas and interests!

I second what Inzil said. This thread seems long-abandoned, and many of us here haven't even seen it before. You could post your proposal here, though it's not a perfect fit, or you could make a new thread for it.

Although we have a newly-made fanfic forum, I think it is quite literally still "under construction" and there are some limitations about posting there. However, you could try the Mirth forum if your story is more of a light entertainment or comedy, or Novices and Newcomers (a forum where various odds and ends tend to get shoved if they don't fit elsewhere) or even Books if it is more serious or more scholarly.

But again, welcome to the Downs, take a cup of your beverage of choice, kick back, and enjoy! Go wherever your fancy takes you. It is much like Rivendell in that everyone is free to wander where they like and take part in all that they enjoy about Tolkien - and there are always more unexplored threads and corners, if you have the time to explore them.

[William Cloud Hicklin]

After the fall of Sauron, an ancient pact between Morgoth and Pallando swings into motion. Beneath the Mountains of the East live The Fathers of the Orcs. These are The Moredhil, and they are the Elves that Melkor stole as they awoke beside Cuivienen. They reside with their leader Morwe, in a huge delving inside the Orocarni. Inside this cavern is another great treasure the Melkor took from Valinor. As is told in The Black Book of Melkor, he took a flower from Telperion, then bathing it in the unlight of Ungoliant and putting forth his dark power into the seedlings, he later planted The Dark Tree. From the light of this Tree would be made a Black Silmaril. It is Pallandos task to gather The rods of Three Wizards (His own, Radagasts and Alatars), The Ring of Saruman and find the Silmaril that Maglor threw into the sea. The reason for all this, to secure the release of Melkor Lord of Arda, and fight The Dagor Dagorath.

Which would still be better than what Amazon is making.

[Herenya]

Inziladun, Galadriel55, thank you both so much for welcoming me, and for your councelling! The advice you gave me helped me see more clearly the path that I will have to take, and discern its final destination, that is, the forum which seems most appropriate for posting of my prospective proposal.

I expect that following the way that would lead me to the Fan Fiction forum would require me to actually write a fanfiction, if my guesses are correct that requests for new fanfics are currently inadmissible. Although it might be an exciting adventure, an attempt to write a fanfiction of such length and detail as that story supports would likely take me a few years of study and trying to improve my writing skills, before I could make it. It's a pity that due to my current circumstances I won't be able to spend that amount of time in the future on writing for my own pleasure alone.

Nevertheless, following your valuable advice, I already seriously thought about asking another question here, namely, whether requests for fanfics are really not permitted in the Fan Fiction forum, or is it just in my imagination. Fortunately, I was finally able to remember the fact that other forums do exist.

Following on, as for the story itself which I talked about, that prequel story is not of a light entertainment or comedy, to my regret. I would honestly not mind to be able to come up with a story taking place in the Fifth Age, the beginning of which was a safe and peaceful period of time according to my version of events. If I could come up with such a story, which I was once almost able to fulfill, and if I was an author confident in their writing abilities, then I would try to write a fanfiction based on that story. Perhaps I would try to make it resemble in some of its features such literary works as, for instance, "Nightmare Abbey" by Thomas Love Peacock, which I had found simultaneously lightly entertaining and humorous after I first got the chance to read it.

However, due to some reasons I couldn't finish my work on the sequel taking place in the Fifth Age which I was just talking about, but I suddenly came up with a story for a prequel while pondering on the confusing plot of the sequel's story. The prequel story which I composed would take place in the midst of the Third Age starting from as early as T.A. 1965. It is a long and sad story the protagonist of which was a Half-elf ranger who dedicated his life to protecting Arthedain from the threat of Angmar, and as a member of a small company of heroes undertook a perilous journey to the east of Middle-earth in a vain attempt to fulfill his most cherished dream.

I'm struggling now with the temptation to provide more details about the events of that story, in case if anyone might be interested in them. However, as my prequel story doesn't fit to this thread, I will make myself not to do spoilers.

So I will most likely try Novices and Newcomers' forum, as my prospective essay is going to be based on my original research, the subject of which is events not described in any of the original sources. I really hope these events don't contradict the official history of Middle-earth set out in the published works of the professor.

As I just noticed that this thread went completely off-topic because of my intrusion, I would like to promise that I will take the liberty to submit another post to this thread someday, particularly concerning the incomplete story for a sequel which I was just talking about.

[Galadriel55]

The fan-fin forum is a relatively new creation and still pretty limited. I don't think you'd be able to able to recruit an author for your fanfic there.

However, as to the second part of your question - the Downs is definitely a good forum for having people fact-check your outline and point out canonical sources. There are plenty of very smart Tolkien erudites and scholars here, you would get some good feedback on the canon aspect. But, saying that - fanfics aren't expected to always be perfectly 100% canonical, that's not their purpose. They build on the canon, and some might even deviate from canon, and that's okay. That's why they are fan-fics.

[Herenya]

Thank you so much for taking some of your invaluable time to answer my question!

Of course, that is most likely not possible. I understand the reasons why that is usually not possible free of charge, so I would never try to impose my own ideas on other users that way.

Now, to be clear, if someone else would be so kind as to take the time to fact-check those two stories for inconsistencies in relation to the canonical sources, that would be amazing. That might actually require some research, and very possibly a lot of it. However, I did not intend to ask other users to fact-check stories which are my personal projects and hence may be of little interest and value to those users. The main outcome that I desired to achieve when I resumed this thread was to try to make those two stories accessible to other scholars and fans of professor Tolkien, in hope that they might be of any value to someone else.

[Herenya]

So after spending some of my free time over the past couple of days immersing myself into reflections on the plot of that prequel story, I'm now starting to wonder if it would be better for the world if it remained untold? The point is that it reminds me more and more of the Professor's trilogy in terms of plot, except that it's already clear now that my story lacks some of the appealing qualities that the latter arguably has, mostly the main character's constrained optimism and belief in getting better.

A company of heroes consisting of a wizard (Gandalf,) an Arnorian half-elf, two Arnorian Dúnedain and two hobbits gathers and sets off on a long and dangerous journey in the hope of being able to find the One Ring in the wetlands of the Gladden Fields, and then take it to Mordor in order to try to destroy it in the fires of Mount Doom. Only that, in their opinion, can save their kingdom of Artedain from impending doom and it has to be done before Angmar has gathered enough forces to start a new devastating war with Artedain.

But their mission is complicated by the fact that Mount Doom was dormant at the time (that is, its caldera was frozen,) as well as by other confusing circumstances. Further events are not developing in the most favorable way for their mission and for the main character himself, as a result of which the protagonist is forced to suffer first from serious anxiety, and then from depression and extreme guilt for the entire second and third parts of the story.

Since at some point it was actually his personal responsibility to decide what the future of Middle-earth would be, and he made this decision alone, on his own, hence for almost the entire remaining two-thirds of the story he is forced to suffer from post-traumatic syndrome and doubts whether the choice he made was the right one. Alongside their ineffectual long journey, events develop in such an unfavorable way that finally it turns out that both the company and the main character personally achieve nothing in terms of their initial task.

The story also features a number of secondary characters, some of whom initiate the main character into secret lore about the structure and history of that "flavour" of Middle-earth in which the events of this story take place. Perhaps some details of the main character's conversations with those supporting characters might seem slightly interesting to someone else. Despite that, I have doubts that the possible readers of my story would be happy to spend so much of their valuable time examining the story that seems so unbearably depressing even to me, differing in this from The Lord of the Rings so strikingly. Perhaps the bitterness of that story could only ruin the mood of its readers for the day, and it would also conceal some of the positive qualities that the story arguably possesses.

Thus I should first try to do something to improve the plot of that story to make it more optimistic and hopeful, and make the bitterness of that story more moderate. I really hope that I will be able to amend the plot in this way somehow, since I have already given much thought to that story, and I've also become too attached to some of the secondary characters. Otherwise, I could only humbly recommend watching some old anime from the mid-90s instead, as I believe that the plots of many of those anime may be more promising than my story's.

[Inziladun]

Well, Herenya, I think if I were in your place, I would ask a friend or two to read my story.
Even if they aren't rabid Tolkien fans, odds are they've at least seen the movies, and could judge whether they think your work derivative.