fantasy – Co-Geeking

Mapping Middle-Earth

November 10, 2025October 26, 2025Erik1 Comment

Want to see something amazing? Check out this project to create a detailed map of Tolkien’s Middle-Earth using modern geographical software.

The level of detail is incredible. There are both 2D and 3D versions of the map that you can zoom in on and fly around like a modern digital map. Here’s a view of Rivendell and the nearby Misty Mountains from the 3D version.

The Middle-Earth Map is a project Micah Vander Lugt, a geographic information sciences analyst. It’s great to see people put their professional skills to work on hobbies that they’re passionate about!

Hey, look! We found a thing on the internet! We thought it was cool, and wanted to share it with you.

Grammatically Female Dwarves in Tolkien

October 22, 2025August 10, 2025Eppu1 Comment

Jimtheviking on Tumblr wrote about how the Dwarven names in J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Hobbit connect with Old Norse, especially Dwarf names listed in the poem Völuspá.

According to Jimtheviking, Tolkien chose a number of names from Old Norse and tweaked those names in an interesting way. Namely, Tolkien grasped Old Norse grammar well enough to know that the omission of one n from a name ending in –inn changed it from masculine to feminine. To quote Jimtheviking:

“Well, I give you the names of the Dwarves from the Hobbit, as they appear in Dvergatal (stanzas 14-16) and in the order they appear:

“Dvalins, Dáinn, Bívurr, Bávurr, Bömburr, Nóri, Óinn, Þorinn, Þráinn, Fíli, Kíli, Glóinn, Dóri, Óri

“Now, in the Hobbit, they’re named as follows:

“Dwalin, Dáin, Bifur, Bofur, Bombur, Nori, Óin, Thorin, Thráin, Fíli, Kíli, Glóin, Dori, Ori.

“Now, you notice something with the way those names got changed? That’s right, he changed the masculine -inn definite suffix to -in, which is feminine.

“That means that, at least grammatically, Dwalin, Dáin, Thorin, Thráin, and Glóin are female Dwarves.”

Then, moving on from purely linguistic, Jimtheviking continues with an intriguing argument:

“Since we know Tolkien was meticulous about his grammar, this was done most likely as an in-joke […] [emphasis original]

“But there’s a not-inconceivable chance that the Dwarves were using the masculine pronouns in Westron because that’s what the Men who met them used, despite the fact that a third of the company was female, and hey, it’s kinda neat to think he wrote a bunch of Dwarf-ladies going on an adventure.”

It is really interesting, isn’t it, to posit male and female Dwarves in Tolkien’s adventures?!

500px Alexander Turchanin Thorin Cosplay

Poking around, I found versions of Völuspá that differ from the Dwarf list as given by Jimtheviking*. Not just the list itself, but also spellings differ depending on the edition you’re using (which isn’t rare at all in philology). Nevertheless, the main point stands: Tolkien changed names that had –inn in the original to just –in in English.

Of all Tolkien’s Dwarf names, he seems to have adopted Durin, Dwalin, Náin, Dáin, Bifur, Bofur, Bombur, Nori, Óin, Thorin, Thrór, Thráin, Fíli, Kíli, Fundin, Náli, Oakenshield (Eikinskjaldi, cf. Icelandic ‘oak shield’), Glóin, Dori, and Ori from the Völuspá.

Of them, Durinn, Dvalinn, Náinn, Dáinn, Óinn, Þorinn, Þráinn, Fundinn, and Glóinn are all originally spelled with a double n. (In addition, there’s a change from a double r to a single one in Bívurr / Bívǫrr, Bávurr / Bávǫrr, and Bömburr / Bǫmburr, which Jimtheviking does also comment on.)

Anyway, the whole thing kinda reminds me of the first time I read The Lord of the Rings, decades ago now. I was young enough that it was in translation, which means the young me ploughing through LotR was quite confused over the gender of some characters. The Finnish language doesn’t have grammatical gender, you see. Instead of he or she, we just have one third-person singular pronoun, hän, which is used of all people regardless of sex, gender, age, kinship, marital status, whatever, just like the English third-person plural they is. Normatively, in Finnish everyone is a hän.

Even at that young age, I knew that (apart from Astrid Lindgren) most of the publications, including those for the younger audience, centered boys and male characters. Contextually, I could tell that Frodo and Sam were male. Same for Legolas and Gimli, Aragorn and Boromir, and Gandalf and Elrond. Arwen, Galadriel, and Eowyn were female.

But Glorfindel? Maybe male, I thought, but there is nothing explicit at all in the Finnish translation. And Merri and Pippin? Somehow at that time I couldn’t make them out at all; indeed, they’re the two characters whose gender confused the young me the most.

Having grown up reading the Moomins, Pippi Longstocking, Ronia the Robber’s Daughter, The Famous Five series, and The Dark Is Rising sequence, I saw nothing odd in girls and women also going on adventures. So I thought it was quite plausible that Merri and Pippin could be female, and was too young to read all of the textual cues that imply they aren’t. (Remember that in Finnish the gender-neutral pronoun hän gives absolutely no clue whatsoever about anyone’s gender.)

The possibility of a linguistic in-joke regarding these Dwarven names really tickles the imagination and would be completely plausible of Tolkien. Interestingly, the name Gandalf also originally comes from the Dvergatal (see e.g. stanza 12 in Pettit’s 2023 edition, which lists the name as Gandálfr). A Dwarven Gandalf would, indeed, give quite a different vibe to LotR.

And now I kinda want new movies of The Hobbit, with the amazing attention to detail that Weta lavished on the effects and props in Peter Jackson’s versions, but with more heedful writing and with half the Dwarves in the party female. That would be a truly intriguing take!

Images: Thorin cosplay by Alexander Turchanin on 500px.

*) Dwarves are named in stanzas 10-16, starting with Mótsognir and Durinn. The undated Völuspá version linked to by Jimtheviking, edited by Guðni Jónsson, includes more rows than the newest edition I found. The extra lines must come from (an)other extant version(s) of the text.

Names in the undated Völuspá version linked to by Jimtheviking (ed. Guðni Jónsson):

Durin (stanza 10: Durinn)

Dwalin (11: Dvalinn)

Náin (11: Náinn)

Dáin (11: Dáinn)

Bifur (11: Bívurr)

Bofur (11: Bávurr)

Bombur (11: Bömburr)

Nori (11: Nóri)

Óin (11: Óinn)

Thorin (12: Þorinn)

Thrór (12: Þrár)

Thráin (12: Þráinn)

Fíli (13)

Kíli (13)

Fundin (13: Fundinn)

Náli (13)

Oakenshield (13, 16: Eikinskjaldi)

Glóin (15: Glóinn)

Dori (15: Dóri)

Ori (15: Óri)

Names in Edward Pettit’s 2023 edition of the Völuspá:

Durin (stanza 10: Durinn)

Dwalin (11: Dvalinn)

Bifur (11: Bívǫrr)

Bofur (11: Bávǫrr)

Bombur (11: Bǫmburr)

Nori (11: Nóri)

Thrain (12: Þráinn)

Thorin (12: Þorinn)

Thrór (12: Þrór)

Fíli (13)

Kíli (13)

Fundin (13: Fundinn)

Náli (13)

Oakenshield (13, 16: Eikinskjaldi)

Gloin (15: Glói)

Note that Pettit’s version doesn’t include Náin, Dáin, Óin, Dori, or Ori.

On, of, and about languages.

Review of the First Pern Book: Dragonflight by Anne McCaffrey

August 27, 2025February 16, 2025Eppu1 Comment

I’ve long been aware of Anne McCaffrey’s Pern books, if only on a superficial level—fantasy, dragons, getting a bit old but supposed to be good; that sort of an idea. While on the lookout for more cozy fiction in our local library, I randomly ran into Dragonflight, the first Pern novel, and decided to finally give it a go.

And before I get into my review: Spoiler warnings in effect! Also, a heads-up on one f-bomb.

It was interesting. No, truly—not the “interesting” interesting, the faux compliment or empty-nothings-version of polite interesting. Really, truly interesting. And it does feel somewhat old. (Published in 1968, so not as old as The Lord of the Rings, to put it into my own SFFnal context).

Humans settled the third planet in the Rukbat solar system and called it Pern. Contact with Earth was broken, however: after two generations, Rukbat’s stray planet (which follows a wildly erratic orbit) came close enough that deadly spores crossed over to Pern and dropped from the sky with devastating losses, not just among the settlers but native Pernese life as well—only solid rock and metal proved impervious.

To burn these devastating silvery threads from the air before they had a chance to land, men and women with high empathy and rudimentary telepathic ability were trained to work with “dragons” bred from indigenous life forms that resembled their mythical Terran namesakes. The process took generations, and a complex, stratified society with tithing responsibility was created to feed and equip the dragonriders while they focused on defence and training in their unfertile mountaintop abodes known as Weyrs.

Each time the stray planet—also known as the Red Star—passes close enough, the Threads fall for a period of 50 years. Then the wanderer swings far enough away and at least another 200 years (sometimes 400 due to the erratic orbit) go by in peace, which is long enough for the rest of the populace to forget and start resenting the tithes and scorning the dragonmen until the next 50-year Pass comes along.

The two main characters are Lessa of Ruatha Hold and dragonrider F’lar of Benden Weyr. We first encounter Lessa as a ragged kitchen girl who survived by serving those who betrayed her family and took over their lands. F’lar offers her a chance to impress a golden dragon, a future queen dragon, with whom she will share a telepathic bond, and to become a Weyrwoman, a co-leader of a Weyr, possibly with F’lar himself.

Over the couple of years it takes for her queen Ramoth to mature, Lessa learns more about the civilization on Pern, the ballads, the teachings, and what it means to be Weyrwoman. The major problem Benden Weyr faces is that another Pass is impending, but there are not enough dragons to protect all of Pern, for currently only one Weyr out of six remains populated; why dragonriders in the others disappeared hundreds of years ago is not known.

The setting falls into fantasy despite the science-fictional premise, but some details deviate from “pure” medieval-European-based fantasy. For instance, the dragons are able to breathe fire after chewing (fueling up on) a native rock called firestone; dragonriders use this ability to destroy as many Threads as possible while they are still falling. Dragons can also travel instantly from one place to another, or one time to another. Furthermore, all dragons are able to converse telepathically and willing to pass on messages from human to human. Finally, crafters (which I wish were talked about more) end up re-inventing flamethrowers to destroy spores that made it to ground.

The structure differs quite a bit from the typical structure of current fantasy novels. The book is divided into four sections that at times felt like they would’ve worked better as individual short stories. Apparently Dragonflight is actually two novellas squished together to make a novel, so that probably explains this tangle.

There were also confusing things. For example, some events span many Turns (the Pernese year) in a very short span of pages and this isn’t very clearly remarked upon. Somewhat annoying was the s’elling of d’agonrider n’mes w’th an a’ostrophe. There is a story-internal reason, but it’s only vaguely referred to.

Moreover, it was frustrating to me that Lessa kept leaping to conclusions and acting without thought; I would’ve liked to see more character development. The description of the society also remains rather narrow, since the POV characters are almost solely Lessa and F’lar. This feels to me like a deliberate choice by the author, not a flaw due to lack of skill, but your mileage may vary.

Some of the more disgusting details include F’lar’s tendency to call Lessa merely “the girl” and to grab and shake her, and yet he cannot fathom why she at times resents him. Hello, dude, could there possibly be a reason…?!? This might be a character development choice, but it never paid off, IMO. Also, during Ramoth’s first mating flight (with Flair’s dragon Mnementh), Lessa was pressured to stay in telepathic contact with her dragon to take advantage of the surge of sexual desire and to essentially manipulate a pairing of Lessa and F’lar, like their dragons.

Browsing reviews, it’s pretty clear that Dragonflight (and likely the rest of the Pern series) has a particular audience that cares deeply for McCaffrey’s approach and worldbuilding; the rest don’t. I can see why many people liked it, and I can also see why many people disliked it.

I saw one reviewer complain that the main problem was solved “easy peasy because of time travel”. I’d say that’s missing the point; to me the focus isn’t how the lack of dragonriders was solved. Instead, the author concentrates on the attempts to get there. How to find the right people and put them in places where they can be most effective. Convincing others, the necessary political maneuverings, discussing possible strategies, etc., to try and wrangle out a solution to a deadly dilemma given these particular constraints. A kind of council of Elrond, if you like, but as a novel.

I found Dragonflight engaging enough that I started reading the sequel, Dragonquest. However, I soon found I didn’t have the motivation to continue the same kind of people-wrangling, when a lot of the interpersonal relations were antagonistic (I do like my stories with a heaping of Learning to Work Together), and especially because F’lar still fucking cannot stop shaking Lessa. I’ll be better off spending my reading time elsewhere, now that the novelty has worn off.

Image by Eppu Jensen

ICBIHRTB—pronounced ICK-bert-bee—is short for ‘I Can’t Believe I Haven’t Read This Before’. It features book classics that have for some reason escaped our notice thus far.

The Sacred Argippaioi

August 18, 2025January 19, 2025ErikLeave a comment

The Greek historian Herodotus provides some interesting information about a people living in the mountains beyond the eastern steppes whom he calls the Argippaioi:

They are said to be bald from birth, men and women alike, and they have flat noses and large chins. They speak their own language, but wear Scythian clothes, and depend on trees for their food. The tree they live off of is called “pontic.” It is about as big as a fig tree and bears stone fruits the size of beans. When the fruit is ripe, they strain it through cloth, and it yields a thick black juice, which they call “askhy.” They lick this juice up or mix it with milk and drink it; they make cakes out of the thickest of the leavings and eat them. They do not keep large flocks, for their pastures are not suited to it. Each of them lives under a tree, which they cover with white wool felt in the winter, but not in the summer. No person harms them, for they are said to be sacred, and they carry no weapons. Their neighbors refer conflicts to them for judgment, and anyone who flees to them for refuge is safe from harm. They are called Argippaioi.

– Herodotus, Histories 4.23 (my translation)

This is an interesting passage both from a historical perspective and as storytelling inspiration.

Historically speaking, many of the details Herodotus presents seem to indicate some actual knowledge of a central Asian culture. The geographic description could apply to the Altai Mountains, which lie east of the broad Eurasian steppes. The physical description of the people might be a garbled attempt to describe Asian features. The description of the tree fruit and its use matches fairly well with traditional ways of using the fruit of the bird cherry. The tree covered in white cloth could be a Greek’s misunderstanding of a chum or other type of tent. In contrast to some of Herodotus’ wilder accounts of the distant regions of the world, it sounds like he may have gathered some fairly accurate information about peoples in central Asia, which he put together as best he could given the limits of his own knowledge. The trade routes that we know as the silk road were already active carrying people and goods across Eurasia in his time, so it is not implausible that during his research among the Scythians he might have learned about peoples at the farther end of the route.

On the other hand, the idea of a sacred people who live without weapons and are left unharmed by their neighbors is an interesting concept to think about as a writer. Herodotus perhaps mistakenly associated privileges that belonged to a priestly or shamanic class with a whole people, but what if there actually were a sacred people living in peace in the mountains, acting as wise advisers to others and providing refuge to the desperate? What would it be like to live in such a culture, and what kind of conflicts could arise among a people who don’t fight? What worldbuilding could you do around such an idea? In one kind of story, the sacred people could be a refuge for the hero on their journey and a source of wise counsel, like the Elves are to Tolkien’s Hobbit heroes. In a different kind of story, imagine how power struggles would play among a people who do not fight, who even must not fight in order to preserve the awe that their neighbors feel for them. Replace the battles and murders of Game of Thrones with competitions over personal purity or devious advice given to neighboring peoples, and you could have a story that is dramatically different but with just as many opportunities for vicious betrayals and sudden reversals.

History can be a great source of writing inspiration when we get it right, but it can spark good narrative ideas even when it’s wrong.

History for Writers looks at how history can be a fiction writer’s most useful tool, from worldbuilding to dialogue.

Official Trailer for the Rebooted Red Sonja

August 8, 2025August 3, 2025EppuLeave a comment

The Red Sonja reboot I mentioned a while back has a trailer out now:

Red Sonja | Official Trailer HD by Samuel Goldwyn Films on YouTube

Hm. Not very many fantasy elements, merely the large cyclopian monster on the arena. Other than that it reminds me of Game of Thrones and not in a good way, sadly.

I’m looking forward to another trailer—at least I’m hoping we’ll get another one—and a few more details, since at this writing it still doesn’t look like there will be a theatrical release in Finland.

Finally, a PSA since some people on the Internet seem to need it: this version of Sonja does not wear a chainmail bikini. I am not an expert in armor, but I do know what chainmail looks like, and this isn’t it. This is scale mail of some sort.

According to IMDB, this version of Red Sonja is already out in Australia, Greece, and Kazakhstan, with releases coming in the U.S. (Aug 13, 2025), Ireland (Aug 18), and Thailand (Aug 21).

Hey, look! We found a thing on the internet! We thought it was cool, and wanted to share it with you.

Quotes: We Are None of Us One Thing Alone and Unchanging

May 7, 2025December 8, 2024Eppu1 Comment

Every now and then you read snippets where an overused truism is poked and prodded in a way that nudges something loose.

“His features, his gestures, his long black braid: All these had become as familiar to me as if I had known them my entire life long, yet I had first encountered him only a few days ago. I did not understand it. Was this what kinship meant? A sense, deep in your bones, that the person next to you is part of you? Inextricable from what you are? That you could not be who you are without their existence as part of the architecture of your very self?

“We are none of us one thing alone and unchanging. We are not static, or at rest. Just as a city or a prince’s court or a lineage is many people in one, so is a person many people within one, always unfinished and always like a river’s current flowing onward ever changing toward the ocean that is greater than all things combined. You cannot step into the same river twice.”

– Catherine in Cold Magic by Kate Elliott

I remember being kinda stunned one time, years ago now, when talking to a coworker and she said she never re-reads books. I find that unfathomable, to be honest. It’s a bit like never eating the same food twice.

Strictly speaking, of course, the two examples are different, since repeatedly cooking the same dishes makes the kind of pragmatic sense that re-reading does not and cannot offer. But if you eat your favorite foods more than once, why wouldn’t you read your favorite books more than once? It’s so exhilarating to gain a deeper or a wider understanding of a work or phenomenon you think you thoroughly know already, because you have changed.

Elliott, Kate. Cold Magic. London: Orbit, 2010, p. 384-385.

Image by Eppu Jensen

Serving exactly what it sounds like, the Quotes feature excerpts other people’s thoughts.

News on a Red Sonja Reboot

March 6, 2025February 23, 2025Eppu1 Comment

If I ever heard of a Red Sonja reboot project, I must’ve immediately forgotten it, for the fate of movie projects is unknowable and often fickle, and that is multiplied for genre projects starring women.

Now, though, it sounds like Millennium Media’s Red Sonja is due for release later this year in the UK and Ireland. This version is directed by M.J. Bassett and written by Tasha Huo and Roy Thomas on the basis of Robert E. Howard’s original comic book characters. Matilda Lutz plays Sonja.

At this writing, IMDB doesn’t list much information and has only 10 photos for the production, including a poster.

Interestingly, IMDB also lists Roy Thomas as an uncredited writer for the comic book. Thomas’s latest big-name project is Deadpool & Wolverine.

I hazily remember the previous adaptation from 1985 starring Brigitte Nielsen. ‘Twas the time when there were so few SFFnal movies and tv series in the boonies where I grew up that you pretty much had to see everything coming your way if you wanted to see anything. If I recall, it was like the 80s Conan adaptations—Conan the Barbarian in 1982 and Conan the Destroyer in 1984—which is to say pretty campy, but attempting very, very, very earnestly to bring epic fantasy to screen.

Bassett’s version is filmed in Bulgaria and Greece, and reportedly will have a different tone from male-gaze versions of the character. While both of these details sound promising, and while I would love to see more genre projects led and directed by women, somehow I seem to doubt the movie will be released on the big screen here in Finland. We’ll see.

Image via IMDB

Lord of the Duckies

March 3, 2025August 25, 2024Erik

Does your bathtime need some extra cute fantasy accessories? Check out these Lord of the Rings rubber duckies!

Here’s Gandalf the Grey. “A wizard is never late, nor is he early. He bathes precisely when he means to.”

Or here’s Eowyn, ready to defend your bathtime from any pesky interfering Nazgul.

You can see the whole selection in the Tubbz section of Just Geek.

We don’t have a bathtub, so I’m not in the market for bath toys myself, but I still think they’re neat.

(Note: We have no relationship with this product or company.)

Hey, look! We found a thing on the internet! We thought it was cool, and wanted to share it with you.

Atypical Illustrations of Elves

January 15, 2025January 12, 2025Eppu2 Comments

We’ve probably all seen endless examples of stereotypical fantasy Elves: those slim, tall, tranquil, ethereal, Art Nouveau-esque figures that glide effortlessly through a major convocation or battle field carnage alike. The type that for example various Weta artists immortalized for Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings and Hobbit trilogies.

I’ve been hankering for something slightly different for a while. (At least in depictions of taller Elves; ElfQuest Elves and other Elves smaller in stature already start with some variety.) Here’s what I’ve come across.

Some illustrators make their Elves with non-stereotypical weaponry or gear. Pavel Hristov’s Steppe Elf carries a whopper of an axe and chews on a stalk of grain. There are also tassels hanging from the piece of cloth on his waist; those don’t seem to go with the Elf stereotype.

ArtStation Pavel Hristov Steppe Elf — Steppe Elf by Pavel Hristov

What neat details!

This Elven marksman explorer by L3monJuic3 has more typical weaponry—bow and arrow—but unlike her, stereotypical Elves are rarely seen carrying backpacks loaded with mundane items like shovels and cauldrons. Elves do typically eat and presumably have other bodily needs, right, even in the more highfalutin high fantasy worlds?

DeviantArt L3monJuic3 Elven Marksman Explorer — Elven Marksman Explorer by L3monJuic3

The Elf war captain Kürbu by Dauntless1942 not only has an atypical name but also atypical armor and polearm:

Reddit Dauntless1942 Elf War Captain — Elf War Captain by Dauntless1942

The helmet somewhat reminds me of Bronze Age Celtic work, but could also nod towards ancient Eurasian steppe cultures.

Other illustrators have tweaked the professions their Elves take up. BootstheBishop drew an artificer—who’s a Sea Elf…

Reddit BootstheBishop Sea Elf Artificer — Sea Elf Artificer by BootstheBishop

…and Rina Smorodina created a wandering Elf mage with an owl familiar:

ArtStation Rina Smorodina Wandering Elf Mage — Wandering Elf Mage by Rina Smorodina

I cannot think off the top of my head any tinkerer nor wanderer type Elves (except for Drizzt Do’Urden in Forgotten Realms), but I don’t consider myself terribly well-read as far as fantasy goes. Anyway, for me these alternative takes were delightful.

Closest to my heart, however, are illustrations of Elves in non-stereotypical environments, especially among birches, in addition to ones showing different body shapes and happy demeanors.

I love all kinds of birches, but they don’t tend to feature in art much, never mind in SFFnal art. I know of two exceptions of the latter: a trailer for season 1 of Andor and a since-scrapped computer game in development. Now I have two to add.

This birchwood Elf by Andrius Matijosius may be a little scruffy-looking, but I love how his cape mimicks birch bark and arrows resemble leaf-topped trunks.

ArtStation Birchwood Elf — Birchwood Elf by Andrius Matijosius

He seems also to be wearing some kind of long knitted robe underneath the cape, which strikes me as sensible in cool fall weather.

Pinterest The Gate of Forest Elf Castle — The Gate of Forest Elf Castle by ZAHD&ART

The Gate of Forest Elf Castle by ZAHD&ART also features fall colors. I love this birch-lined alley. A forest of birches with their white trunks lined up always looks so striking.

(Next, though, artists, how about depicting birch woods in the summer? Please and thank you!)

Moving to physical characteristics. Un Lee’s illustration of an Elf company is marvellous! Lee wanted to create a varied group much like the Dwarves in the Hobbit but with Elves instead.

ArtStation Un Lee Elf Company — Elf Company by Un Lee

They are absolutely fantastic! No unrealistic and boring copy-paste Elves here; each individual is exactly that, an individual.

Reddit eccentric_bee Ancient Elf — Ancient Elf by eccentric_bee

Besides uniform body shapes, stereotypical Elves come in a fairly narrow range of moods. This portrait of an ancient Elf by eccentric_bee is serene on the surface, yes, but it looks to me that there’s joy underneath that’s often missing in depictions of Elves. Love it!

In Making Stuff we share fun arts and crafts done by us and our fellow geeks and nerds.