Top Ten Tuesday #408

Hi everyone, I hope you’ve all had a good week since I last did one of these. I’ve got a really busy week coming up, or a busy few evenings anyway, as I have my regular Spanish class tomorrow night, then I’m going to the theatre on Thursday (I know it seems like I’ve been doing that a lot lately, this is definitely not a regular occurrence, I’ve just found quite a few good deals this month on things I want to see!) to see the new musical at the Old Vic, Sylvia. Being a big history nerd, I’m always very happy when I hear about new historical musicals and I’ve been hearing really good stuff about this one so I’m excited to see it. Then on Friday, I’m going to be at Samantha Shannon’s launch event for A Day of Fallen Night which I’m super excited for as the last event of hers I went to was for Priory back in 2019 (in-person anyway, and when she was the featured author, I went to her virtual launch of The Mask Falling in the pandemic and she was the moderator for VE Schwab’s London Gallant event last year). If any of my UK followers are also going to be at the London event on Friday, then let me know, I’d love to meet you and I’ll be there by myself, so I’m always eager to chat to other fellow book lovers.

Anyway, as always, today’s Top Ten Tuesday is courtesy of Jana at That Artsy Reader Girl and today we’re talking Favourite Heroines. I was quite surprised when I searched the archives to see that this wasn’t a topic I’d done before as it seems like one I would do for a freebie or something, but I guess not! As you’ll all know if you’ve been following me for a while, I love female characters in books, so this was a pretty straightforward list for me to put together and in a surprise to exactly no one, I have more than ten:

1. Hermione Granger-Harry Potter Series-JK Rowling

I do try not to use Harry Potter very often on my lists anymore as I prefer not to give JK Rowling anymore spotlight than necessary these days due to the trash fire that she has turned out to be, however I couldn’t do this list and not include Hermione given that she’s always been one of my favourite book characters. Hermione made young nerdy book loving Jo feel very seen, although I have to say I don’t think she’d like me very much if she was real and we met because though I did fine at school, I wasn’t particularly studious!

2. Katniss Everdeen-The Hunger Games trilogy-Suzanne Collins

I love Katniss, she’s so brave and strong and loyal and I can definitely relate to her sarcastic sense of humour. But the thing that definitely endeared me most to her was her love for Prim, I’ve always loved sister stories, having an older sister myself, so it was that more than her skills as a fighter or anything else which really made me fall in love with her character.

3. Matilda Wormwood-Matilda-Roald Dahl

Much like Hermione, I could massively relate to Matilda. I wasn’t read Dickens or anything when I was five, but my favourite thing to do was go to the library every week and come back with massive stacks of books to read and escape into fictional worlds.

4. Liesel Meminger-The Book Thief-Markus Zusak

Surprise, surprise, yet another fictional bookworm on this list. What can I say? I read about other readers and I instantly wish I could be their friends. Her relationship with Hans was massively endearing to me, I loved reading about him teaching her to read and seeing her fall in love with words. I also loved how she was able to use her love of books to rebel against the Nazis in both small and larger ways.

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

I know I always talk about how much I love Percy but I really do love Annabeth too, as I said, I’ve got a soft spot for the bookworms! I love how smart and brave she is, and how she’s always quick to put Percy in his place and she’s got quite the biting wit too especially when bantering with Percy. Also if I could have one demigod item, I would totally steal her invisibility hat as it seems incredibly useful.

6. Queenie-Code Name Verity-Elizabeth Wein

I always wonder about what name to use for Queenie as she has several throughout the book and any one could potentially be spoilery, but I’ll go with Queenie as that’s what Maddie knows her by. Queenie is the exact kind of female character that completely grabbed my whole heart from the first second I read about her, she’s brave, she’s incredibly funny, she’s smart and fiercely loyal and her friendship with Maddie is absolutely everything. I was so thrilled that Wein wrote more about her in The Pearl Thief and The Enigma Game because I was not ready to let her go by the end of the book.

7. Lila Bard-Shades of Magic Trilogy-VE Schwab

Lila Bard has the kind of confidence that most of us could only dream of, and that I will definitely admit, I’m a little envious of. I fell in love with her pretty much as soon as she was introduced in A Darker Shade of Magic as she’s the kind of female character I’ve always had a soft spot for: fierce, brave, funny, slightly reckless and does whatever she wants regardless of the consequences, and she’s just so much fun to follow as a character. I absolutely cannot wait to see her in Threads of Power, VE Schwab posted a little teaser on Instagram recently, and when I tell you I was SQUEALING when I read it…..yes I have missed Lila Bard!

8. Nina Zenik-Grishaverse-Leigh Bardugo

Nina is 1000% my favourite female Grisha in the books, she’s incredibly funny, she has that wonderful confidence, her Grisha powers are incredibly cool and loves all the sweet treats, so definitely a woman after my own heart! I really loved how Danielle Galligan played her in Shadow and Bone Season 1 and I can’t wait to see her back in Season 2!

9. Nahri-The Davebad Trilogy-S.A. Chakraborty

Nahri is another of those characters who I loved the second she strolled onto the page. She’s clever, funny, incredibly fierce and brave and I was absolutely rooting for her from the very first page. I would absolutely steal her ability to speak to any language-it would make learning Spanish a heck of a lot quicker!

10. Amani Al’Hiza-Rebel of The Sands Trilogy-Alwyn Hamilton

Honestly I loved Amani for the same reasons as I love a lot of the characters on this list (I definitely have a type when it comes to favourite heroines it seems!). I loved how strong and smart she was, how feisty she was, how determined and compassionate and how much she was willing to fight to get what she wanted. I definitely found it incredibly easy to root for her!

11. Felicity Montague-The Montague Siblings Trilogy-Mackenzi Lee

Felicity is definitely my favourite of the three Montague Siblings, her dry and sarcastic sense of humour is quite similar to my own so I could relate on that front. She’s also really smart, and determined to get what she wants and is absolutely done with 18th century sexism (I mean who wouldn’t be? I’m also very done with 21st century sexism) and if Monty and Percy hadn’t had her with them on their trip then they absolutely would have died. Many, many times.

12. Izzy O’Neill-Izzy O’Neill duology-Laura Steven

Izzy’s sense of humour had me in complete hysterics throughout the entirety of The Exact Opposite of Okay and immediately endeared me to her because I could relate a lot, both to her style of humour (it’s quite dry and sarcastic and a little immature) and the way that she used humour as a shield against the difficult things in her life. She’s also completely obsessed with food, and yup, I also really love my food. Basically I think Izzy and I could be really good friends if she was a real person!

So there we go, those are some of my favourite heroines, I think I can basically narrow my favourite kinds of characters into these categories: smart/likes books, funny, obsessed with food, brave or has serious self-confidence, or any and all combinations of these things! Have you read any of these books? Did we share any of these heroines on our lists today? What kind of heroines do you like? Let me know in the comments!

Next week’s topic is a Genre Freebie, and since I had fun doing If You Liked This Book…..Try This TV Show a couple of years ago, I’m going to do If You Liked This Book……Try This Book recommendations list and try and recommend some similar books to some of my favourites!