Top Ten Tuesday #367

Hi everyone! I hope you’ve all had a good week since I last did one of these, mine has been fairly quiet, I’ve just been working as usual.

Anyway, it’s Tuesday, and so that means another Top Ten Tuesday, courtesy of Jana at That Artsy Reader Girl. This week’s topic is Bookish Characters, so I thought I’d just talk about ten of my favourite bookish characters. I was a little worried this list would be quite similar to one I did a few years back on Characters Who Would Make Good Book Club Leaders, but I’ve read a lot of books since then and only about half of this list is the same! So I think that’s reasonably good going:

1. Hermione Granger-Harry Potter series-JK Rowling

I do try to limit my Harry Potter features as much as possible these days, given that JK Rowling is…..awful to put it mildly, but I couldn’t talk about my favourite bookish characters without mentioning Hermione! Hermione was one of the first characters I read about that really felt like me (although I have to say, I was never as studious as she was!) and so she’ll always have a special place in my heart. And without her, Ron and Harry would not have made it past book one…..

2. Annabeth Chase-Percy Jackson and The Olympians-Rick Riordan

Who’s excited for the Percy Jackson Disney+ series? I’m super excited, I can’t wait to see how the trio do, and so happy to see actual kids in the roles! Annabeth I love for a lot of the same reasons as Hermione, but I also thought it was so cool to see a kid with dyslexia who still really loves reading even though it’s not always easy for her.

3. Liesel Meminger-The Book Thief-Markus Zusak

The way Liesel just wants to devour stories, just loves words so much that she would do anything for them, I feel that. Though I don’t think I’d resort to stealing…..though she does steal quite a few from book burnings, so maybe it’s more like liberating? Anyway, I just love her and the joy and power that she is able to find from words and stories.

4. Grace Bennett-The Last Bookshop In London-Madeline Martin

Honestly, if I had to describe Grace Bennett, it would basically be, Liesel Meminger as a grown up but English and with less book stealing. The two are eerily similar! What I loved most about Grace though was getting to see her foster a love of reading as an adult, so many books about readers show them discovering their passion as kids, which is great, but it was also really cool to see a book where the MC hasn’t had a lifelong passion for books but through finding the right book for her, is able to open a door into a whole world of reading!

5. Matilda Wormwood-Matilda-Roald Dahl

As a book loving kid, Matilda just had my whole heart. Her coming back from the library with a trolley full of books…..I could definitely relate to that, I never had a trolley, but I would always take out huge stacks of books every week from the library and read them as fast as I could before coming back the next week to devour more!

6. Alizayd Al-Qahtani-The Daevabad Trilogy-SA Chakraborty

As far as I can tell, Ali is less a fiction reader, and more a reader of history and thick economics documents, but a book nerd is a book nerd, no matter what you love to read about! The fact that he and Nahri bonded over him teaching her how to read definitely endeared me to him where I’d initially been lukewarm. Nothing turns a bookworm to your side faster than knowing you are one of us!

7. Edwin Courcey-A Marvellous Light-Freya Marske

HE USED MAGIC TO BUILD HIS OWN LIBRARY CLASSIFICATION SYSTEM. I can’t even with how beautifully nerdy and wonderful that is. Edwin is a prickly bookworm with a secret heart of gold and for that we must protect him at all costs. I was slightly lukewarm with A Marvellous Light overall, but my love for Edwin and Robin definitely kept me reading.

8. Enrique Mercado-Lopez-The Gilded Wolves Trilogy-Roshani Chokshi

I would love to just sit down with Enrique over a large slice of cake and chat about history. I think we’d have an amazing time!

9. Aelin Galathynius-Throne of Glass series-Sarah J Maas

I have an Aelin quote on my wall: “I can survive well enough on my own if given the proper reading material.” And honestly? Same Aelin, same. I wasn’t actually a massive fan of Aelin in the beginning but she grew on me over the course of the books, and I think her love of reading definitely helped that.

10. Mila Pavlichenko-The Diamond Eye-Kate Quinn

All of Kate Quinn’s characters in her books I’ve read so far have been readers, which is understandable that authors pass on their passions to their characters, but Mila was actually a real person and one of the things that immediately endeared her to me was her passion for history as that’s obviously something I share. I loved the fact that her dissertation was on such a niche nerdy topic and that she brought it to the battlefield with her!

So there we go, those are some of my favourite bookish characters, both new and old! Have you read any of these books? Who are some of your favourite bookish characters? Let me know in the comments!

I’ll be back next week with another Top Ten Tuesday, we’re talking Books I Was So Excited To Get But Still Haven’t Read, and OH BOY. This could be a long one.