Jared, Oriana and Ned talk about Ned’s choice of topic: Dennis L. McKiernan’s Silver Call Duology! Originally conceived in the late seventies and then published in the eighties, it is clearly meant to be a sequel to The Lord of the Rings in practically every aspect but name. Or rather, names, a lot of which are infelicitous at best, to Ned’s amusement and Jared and Oriana’s loud annoyance, in this, our longest episode so far. (Also, frankly, our sweariest—not constantly, but those with younger household members should take a little care!) Is this the most (excessively) detailed, formally published fanwork ever in terms of Tolkien? Why in the world is there an elf character named Shannon? Did McKiernan have any real sense about how poetry works, much less invented languages? (And what’s with his apostrophes?) How does McKiernan’s work slot in among the other post-Tolkien fantasies of its time and place? Exactly how many analogs to the Orcs are there, and why are they then named so many different ways—without vowels? Is there in fact an actually intriguing part to anything in the story? And above all else, exactly why is the character of Cotton so incredibly annoying?