Wednesday, October 10, 2012

Top Ten Tuesday


Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly feature hosted by The Broke and the Bookish. A new topic is posted each week, and bloggers share their top ten in the category. I love making lists, especially about books, so when I found out about Top Ten Tuesday, I had to participate.

Top Ten Tuesday Rewind
Top Ten Characters That Remind You of Yourself or Someone You Know

10. Elsie
Notes from an Accidental Band Geek
By Erin Dionne

Elsie reminds me so much of one of my best friends, it's almost scary. When I first picked up this book from the library, I mentioned it to her casually - sort of a, "Hey, this book is about a girl who plays the French horn, like you." Then I started reading. And not only was Elsie's personality kind of similar, but the physical description - "Short for her age, with blond hair and brown eyes," - was an exact description of my friend. I've told her she has to read this book, because it's basically about her. 

9. Callie
Pay The Piper
By Jane Yolen and Adam Stemple

From here on out, the characters are all ones who remind me of myself, and even though there aren't a whole lot of similarities, I could easily relate to Callie because of one thing: her taste in music. It includes rock and alternative/folk-style music, which I absolutely love. A person's taste in music can say a lot about them, so the fact that Callie's preferences were so similar to mine means we're probably at least somewhat alike. 

8. Helmholtz
Brave New World
by Aldous Huxley

I wrote my final paper for English class last year on Helmholtz, and it came back with relatively few comments from my teacher except, "I'm not surprised you were able to identify with him." Helmholtz is a writer, a creative person who doesn't just want to write about the same things over and over. He wants his words to have meaning, and believes that miserable conditions can lead to inspiration. Basically what goes through my head on an almost daily basis. 

7. Tessa Gray
The Infernal Devices
By Cassandra Clare

Maybe it's the fact that she reads so much and goes through life referencing her favorite classic novels. Maybe it's something else. All I know is that I've always found Tessa very similar to myself, which is probably one of the reasons I loved her character - and these books - so much. 

6. Jane Penderwick
The Penderwicks series
By Jeanne Birdsall

Jane reminds me so much of myself when I was younger. She wants to be a writer, has notebooks full of stories that she's constantly adding to, sees everything in life as inspiration, and spends more time daydreaming than she probably should. Reading about Jane Penderwick is like reading about myself a few years in the past. 

5. Rose Anna
Write Naked
By Peter Gould

Mention that Rose Anna is "A homeschooled free spirit with a vintage fountain pen," and most people who know me would probably make the connection. Although Rose Anna is different from me in several aspects, a list of our similarities would be much longer: I was homeschooled up until high school, write stories all the time, and still do a lot of writing by hand.

4. Meggie Folchart
Inkheart
By Cornelia Funke

"Stacks of books were piled high all over the house - not just arranged in neat rows on bookshelves, the way other people kept them, oh no! The books in Mo and Meggie's house were stacked under tables, on chairs, in the corners of the rooms." 

This is almost all I really need to say about my similarity to Meggie Folchart. For the sake of being thorough, I'll mention the fact that I, too, stay up far too late reading, sometimes by candlelight, believe books can have personalities, treat them like old friends, and have been known to fall asleep with a book under my pillow. Despite any flaws in her character in the later books, I will always love Meggie because the two of us are so alike.

3. Sara Crewe
A Little Princess
By Frances Burnett

I loved this book so much, and I used to pretend I was Sara Crewe quite frequently. It was never that much of a stretch. Like Sara, I love books and learning. But the most prominent similarity is imagination; pretending and making up stories is a huge part of Sara's life and how she gets through difficult situations, and the same is definitely true of me. 

2. Ananka Fishbein
Kiki Strike
By Kirsten Miller

I'm not afraid to admit it: Ananka and I are a lot alike. Yes, I do read everything I can get my hands on and therefore know things about the most obscure topics. (Antibiotic resistance in bacteria or coat-color genetics in cats? Ask me and give my useless knowledge a purpose.) I'm up for adventure just slightly less than Ananka is - I'm just careful enough to keep me out of trouble (mostly.) And while I have no plans to become a Marine biologist, I do find giant squid really interesting. 

1. Joan/Newt
The Wild Girls
by Pat Murphy

Joan = Me. Joan's life = My life. Even her writing style, based on excerpts of her stories that were in the book, is a little like mine. This was the only option for number one. Joan is my book-character-alter-ego, pretty much, and the relatable characters are a big part of what made this book one of my favorites of all time. 

~blackandwhitdreamer





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