Top Ten Tuesday: Character Traits I Love

1️⃣ The Sarcastic Type

Yeah, that’s everyone’s number one as of late, huh? I mean we have Percy Jackson, Harry Potter, nearly every YA heroine…

What can I say? I’m pretty basic with this one but it’s popular for a reason. It’s FUN. And fun is important to me as a reader. Besides, who doesn’t want to read about that person who stuck it to the big baddie and even the bus driver laughed?? Come on, don’t lie to me.

Of course, it can be overdone and badly done and all of that but it is a risk worth taking because this is a classic.

2️⃣ True to Themselves

I love to read about people with their moral code.

They may be a total mess of a person but they know where the boundaries lie and they would rather do it their way and die than bend and live another day. They stay true to their character.

It usually also entails loyalty to others as well or loyalty to some cause or simply loyalty to humanity. 

Kate Daniels‘ life would be so much easier without protecting anyone but can she walk away if she sees somebody who needs help? No. No matter how fucked up she is she puts up her share and doesn’t walk away until the deed is done.

3️⃣ The Mastermind

I love a character with a plan.

The thinker. The one who plays mind games, manipulates the situation, whose super power is their inteligence. 

We saw the raise of Sansa Stark, Kaz Brekker and his long sighted plans. Personally, I also love Teodora DiSangro from The Brilliant Death. 

They all can stay cold blooded in stressful situations and play the long game. Of coure, they cannot predict everything and they have to mess up sometimes and fail to keep things believable and interesting but, come on, it will be a pleasure to see them get out of that.

4️⃣ Idealistic / Realistic combo

I know it’s technically two traits and two characters but it works best juxtaposed. 

Crier has been raised in a palace. She doesn’t witness the cruelty of the world first hand. She knows that humans are second class citizens and she wants to fix that but she believes that she can do it by writing papers and convincing the ruling class. She is naive.

Ayla knows blood well. She knows that you won’t get anything you don’t fight for and the fight doesn’t guagantee it either. 

I love those contrasting viewpoints and they make characters seem so much more intense? 

5️⃣ The Morally Grey Type

Another popular one.

Come on, there’s at least one morally grey character you enjoyed. Was it Kaz Brekker? Loki? I think V.E. Shwab has some.

My last favourite is Maika from Monstress. She survived an internment camp and she’s mostly self-serving but she also shows a caring side from time to time. She doesn’t want to be irredeemable but won’t give up on herself either even if it may endanger others. She is forced by circumstances but she’s walking a thin line.

And we love that thin line, don’t we? That push and pull. That slipping in and out of darkness. That do they deserve a redemption?? It’s just so addictive…

6️⃣ Lovable Scoundrel

We all love Han Solo. We all lust over Valkyrie from Thor: Ragnarok.

Why?

They’re one mess of a human being (or, you know, a goddess) but they’re still kind of a softie underneath it all.

Here, I chose a less known example — Aela Crane. A pirate forced to work for the crown she hates. She would gladly abandon the quest but she doesn’t really have options right now and she has to bid her time. She’ll go through this and then she’ll get her revenge. Unless she makes a friend along the way and starts caring about people. Wait, what??

7️⃣ The Rebel

Ah, we all love rebelious types.

I don’t care about rebelling without a cause though. It’s just annoying. If you rebel, I want it to be against injustice not just some boring teenage hormones. I had enough of it in real life already.

Arnaka Skytree is rebelling against the mysoginistic society she’s living in as well as the classism and entitlement of the rulling class. She believes that by conforming to the injust society she has the blood of those who are harmed by it on her hands and inaction is being complicit.

8️⃣ The Oblivious One

Oh, I will always find a way to include slow-burn and pinning everywhere.

And what a better way to have both of those than to make one of the pair oblivious as fuck???

Plus, it’s a pure comedy.

Wei WuXian from Mo Dao Zu Shi is one of the most intelligent men alive (and dead, I guess? It’s not a spoiler — he just comes back to life at the start of the novel) but, oh boy, can he be dumb??? Took him like 20 years to realise that a boy is in love with him. Somebody help that bisexual disaster, please…

9️⃣ A Total Agent of Chaos

I could put Loki in here, there’s so much content with him but no, I had to go with this minor character I was obsessed as a kid.

Erra appears in the 4th Kate Daniels novel and she’s one of my favourite characters ever. 

I can’t spoil who she is but she’s such a shithead. She’s smart and she can care for a few chosen ones in a way but she’s also batshit crazy and wants you to know that.

I mean, what else do you want from a woman?? I’m in love.

🔟 Determined

I read once that a character always always needs a goal. They need to want something or there’s no plot.

Tiffany Aching wants many things. Then she also needs many things. 

And she never expects to get them for free. She doesn’t even consider not being the one who puts in the work and gets a job done. 

There are other characters like that. I also love Adam Parrish from TRC. But Tiffany also has that simplicity of a child that makes her determination really the focus of her character. She wants a thing? She gets up and gets it.