Top Ten Tuesday: Favorite Heroines

hosted by The Broke and the Bookish.

1. Hermione Jean Granger (Harry Potter) - I have to give it up to the female character that shaped my childhood and showed me that I could be smart and awesome at the same time.  Hermione is one of the great female characters ever written and I love her dearly.

2. Ginny Wealsey (Harry Potter) - Ginny is another one of those defining female characters for me.  She is a complete badass and I love her for it.  What I love even more is that she was brave enough to send someone she liked a singing valentine when she was eleven.  That takes guts people!

3. Elizabeth Bennet (Pride and Prejudice) - Jane Austen knows how to write excellent female characters, but Lizzie always struck a chord with me.  She loves reading just as much as I do and she never let a thing a social graces or a single man in possession of good fortune distract her from what she wanted in life.


4.  Cinder (The Lunar Chronicles) - Cinder is a piece of work and she is not an average teenage girl. She, in fact, has much bigger issues than the average teenage girl, but she still has the normal ones as well.  One of the reasons I like her so much is that among all of her amazing butt kicking moments, she still freaks out about a guy and reacts to situations in an appropriate manner of a sixteen year old.

5. Sabrina and Daphne (The Sister Grimm) - I love these sisters.  They are a dynamic duo and take care of each other, but they also fight like sisters.  Everything about them is realistic, perhaps not their heritage but you never know.  There are times when Daphne knows better than her older sister but they compliment each other well.  That's why they work.  That and they fight fairytale crime, which is awesome!

6. Kira (Gathering Blue) - I love Kira's boldness and her absolutely headstrong determination to live despite the world and everyone around her wanting different.  I love that in her world where different is unfathomable, unforgivable and she embodies what her society hates.  I love how brave and independent she becomes and the transformation we see in the book.

7. Opal (Because of Winn-Dixie) - Opal's point of view in this story is the reason I love her so much.  She's young and a lot has happened to her that she doesn't quite understand, yet she goes around trying to figure it out.  She takes initiative in making friends and talking to new people when she moves into town.  She kind and gentle and understanding.

8. Minny Jackson (The Help) - Two words: Shit Pie.  That's all I need to describe why I love Minny so much.

9. Annabeth Chase (Percy Jackson) - Aside from her incredible wisdom and her baseball cap of invisibility, Annabeth is a bundle of fierce sarcasm and loyalty.  She kicks butt when she needs too and is an incredible friend to boot.  Percy and the gang are lucky to have her around.

10. Tess (Legend) - Tess is an awesome heroine for multiple reasons but the one I like the most is that when things don't go her way, she doesn't become bitter about it.  Yes, she gets upset and has to distance herself but in the end she doesn't spiral into hatred or any other self-depreciating manner.  She moves on from the turmoil and is stronger for it.