[Top Ten Tuesday] Diverse Characters

Top Ten Tuesday was created by The Broke and the Bookish. A prompt is given each week, and I hope to do it every week so I always have something going up on Tuesdays. This week I am talking about ten of my favorite diverse main characters. Like always, if I have a review for each book I'll link them!

 

Willowdean Dickson 

Willowdean is a plus sized character in the book Dumplin' by Julie Murphy who's weight is brought up a lot in her life, and I think she's a really great fat character. She is very realistic when it comes to her insecurities with her body, but she's also a great role model because of her confidence. I like that Julie Murphy wrote a character that is both insecure at times and confident at times because that's pretty spot on when it comes to my experience and I assume the experience of many fat women/men.
Synopsis:
Self-proclaimed fat girl Willowdean Dickson (dubbed "Dumplin" by her former beauty queen mom) has always been at home in her own skin. Her thoughts on having the ultimate bikini body? Put a bikini on your body. With her all-American beauty best friend, Ellen, by her side, things have always worked...until Will takes a job at Harpy's, the local fast-food joint. There she meets Private School Bo, a hot former jock. Will isn't surprised to find herself attracted to Bo. But she is surprised that he seems to like her back. Instead of finding new heights of self-assurance in her relationship with Bo, Will starts to doubt herself. So she sets out to take back her confidence by doing the most horrifying thing she can imagine: entering the Miss Clover City beauty pageant - along with several other unlikely candidates - to show the world that she deserves to be up there as much as any twiggy girl does. Along by the way, she'll shock the hell out of Clover City and maybe herself most of all.

 Aristotle Mendoza and Dante Quintana 

Both Ari and Dante from Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe by Benjamin Alire Sáenz are Mexican-American, so right there they are diverse characters, but also this is a LGBTQ+ book, Dante identifies as gay and we aren't sure about Ari's sexual identity for now (hopefully in the sequel!). Also, Ari is dealing with his brother being in prison and the affect it has on him emotionally and in his family. I absolutely love this book, it's currently my favorite book and has been since I first read it a year and a half ago.
Synopsis:  
Aristotle is an angry teen with a brother in prison. Dante is a know-it-all who has an unusual way of looking at the world. When the two meet at the swimming pool, they seem to have nothing in common. But as the loners start spending time together, they discover that they share a special friendship—the kind that changes lives and lasts a lifetime. And it is through this friendship that Ari and Dante will learn the most important truths about themselves and the kind of people they want to be.

Starr Carter 

Starr Carter, the main character in the book The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas is a black sixteen-year-old girl from a poor neighborhood. She is the only witness in the tragedy ofher childhood friend getting shot by a police officer. She is dealing with the hard choice of either speaking up or not because fear of angering the wrong people. 
Synopsis:
Sixteen-year-old Starr Carter moves between two worlds: the poor neighborhood where she lives and the fancy suburban prep school she attends. The uneasy balance between these worlds is shattered when Starr witnesses the fatal shooting of her childhood best friend Khalil at the hands of a police officer. Khalil was unarmed. Soon afterward, his death is a national headline. Some are calling him a thug, maybe even a drug dealer and a gangbanger. Protesters are taking to the streets in Khalil's name. Some cops and the local drug lord try to intimidate Starr and her family. What everyone wants to know is: what really went down that night? And the only person alive who can answer that is Starr. But what Starr does or does not say could upend her community. It could also endanger her life.
 

 

Dimple Shah 

Dimple from When Dimple Met Rishi is a Indian-American girl who has just graduated high school and is going to a summer program for aspiring web developers. Dimple is such a great character because she wants to focus on her studies and her passion for web design more than finding an Indian husband, something her mother has been pushing more and more frequently. 
Synopsis: 
Dimple Shah has it all figured out. With graduation behind her, she’s more than ready for a break from her family, from Mamma’s inexplicable obsession with her finding the “Ideal Indian Husband.” Ugh. Dimple knows they must respect her principles on some level, though. If they truly believed she needed a husband right now, they wouldn’t have paid for her to attend a summer program for aspiring web developers…right? Rishi Patel is a hopeless romantic. So when his parents tell him that his future wife will be attending the same summer program as him—wherein he’ll have to woo her—he’s totally on board. Because as silly as it sounds to most people in his life, Rishi wants to be arranged, believes in the power of tradition, stability, and being a part of something much bigger than himself. The Shahs and Patels didn’t mean to start turning the wheels on this “suggested arrangement” so early in their children’s lives, but when they noticed them both gravitate toward the same summer program, they figured, Why not? Dimple and Rishi may think they have each other figured out. But when opposites clash, love works hard to prove itself in the most unexpected ways.

Natasha "Tash" Zelenka 

Tash from Tash Hearts Tolstoy by Kathryn Ormsbee is a asexual main character. I identify as Biromantic Demisexual, and demisexuality is a branch of asexuality so although it isn't completely the same, a lot of Tash's thoughts and how she was feeling was the closest I have read to how I felt about my own sexual identity. At least on the demisexual side of things. From what I hear from other asexual readers, this is a pretty great depiction of asexuality, which is great because it isn't a popular theme in books or really any form of media. 
Synopsis: 
After a shout-out from one of the Internet’s superstar vloggers, Natasha “Tash” Zelenka finds herself and her obscure, amateur web series, Unhappy Families, thrust into the limelight: She’s gone viral. Her show is a modern adaptation of Anna Karenina—written by Tash’s literary love Count Lev Nikolayevich “Leo” Tolstoy. Tash is a fan of the forty thousand new subscribers, their gushing tweets, and flashy Tumblr GIFs. Not so much the pressure to deliver the best web series ever. And when Unhappy Families is nominated for a Golden Tuba award, Tash’s cyber-flirtation with Thom Causer, a fellow award nominee, suddenly has the potential to become something IRL—if she can figure out how to tell said crush that she’s romantic asexual. Tash wants to enjoy her newfound fame, but will she lose her friends in her rise to the top? What would Tolstoy do?

Faith Herbert 

Faith is a fat superhero woman who is my absolute favorite superhero. I love her so much. Her weight is never brought up, she is competent and badass, and she has dated (and is dating) conventionally "good looking" guys. I love her so much for so many reasons, but my biggest reason is the fact that if I had these comics when I was younger I think I would have accepted my body quicker. 
 Synopsis (for the first volume of Faith): 
Orphaned at a young age, Faith Herbert - a psionically gifted "psiot" discovered by the Harbinger Foundation - has always aspired to greatness. But now this once ordinary teenager is taking control of her destiny and becoming the hard-hitting hero she's always known she can be - complete with a mild-mannered secret identity, unsuspecting colleagues, and a day job as a reporter that routinely throws into her harms way! Well, at least she thought it would When she's not typing up listicles about cat videos, Faith makes a secret transformation to patrol the night as the City of Angels' own leading superhero - the sky-soaring Zephyr!
But flying solo is going to be tougher than she ever thought when Zephyr uncovers a deep-rooted alien conspiracy. Two-bit burglars and car thieves are one thing, but when the world needs a hero to stave off an full-blown extraterrestrial invasion, will Faith find herself in over her head or ready for her biggest challenge yet?
Rising star Jody Houser (Orphan Black) and explosive artists Francis Portela (Green Lantern) and Marguerite Sauvage (DC Comics Bombshells) pilot a new chapter for the high-flying hero that People Magazine calls "a superhero we can all admire."

 Eliza Mirk 

Eliza, from the book Eliza and Her Monsters by Francesca Zappia, has anxiety and tends to stay closed off with people in her life. She doesn't talk almost at all while at school, when she's home she locks herself in her room with her computer, and she prefers her friends online versus any friends she could have at school or in her "real" life. 
Synopsis:
In the real world, Eliza Mirk is shy, weird, and friendless. Online, she’s LadyConstellation, the anonymous creator of the wildly popular webcomic Monstrous Sea. Eliza can’t imagine enjoying the real world as much as she loves the online one, and she has no desire to try. Then Wallace Warland, Monstrous Sea’s biggest fanfiction writer, transfers to her school. Wallace thinks Eliza is just another fan, and as he draws her out of her shell, she begins to wonder if a life offline might be worthwhile. But when Eliza’s secret is accidentally shared with the world, everything she’s built—her story, her relationship with Wallace, and even her sanity—begins to fall apart.

 Simon Spier 

Simon, from Simon vs The Homo Sapiens Agenda by Becky Albertalli, is a closested gay boy who is dealing with someone knowing he's gay and blackmailing him with it, dealing with an online relationship he has with a boy who hasn't been warm to the idea of them meeting face to face, and struggling with the aspect of coming out to the ones he loves. I love Simon as a character and I love this book so much. 
Synopsis: Sixteen-year-old and not-so-openly gay Simon Spier prefers to save his drama for the school musical. But when an email falls into the wrong hands, his secret is at risk of being thrust into the spotlight. Now Simon is actually being blackmailed: if he doesn’t play wingman for class clown Martin, his sexual identity will become everyone’s business. Worse, the privacy of Blue, the pen name of the boy he’s been emailing, will be compromised. With some messy dynamics emerging in his once tight-knit group of friends, and his email correspondence with Blue growing more flirtatious every day, Simon’s junior year has suddenly gotten all kinds of complicated. Now, change-averse Simon has to find a way to step out of his comfort zone before he’s pushed out—without alienating his friends, compromising himself, or fumbling a shot at happiness with the most confusing, adorable guy he’s never met.

Ramona Blue 

  
Ramona Blue by Julie Murphy is about Ramona, a teenage girl who identifies as a lesbian and has a summer romance with a girl. When that girl leaves and goes back home once the summer ends, Ramona finds herself becoming good friends with a boy she used to be really close with when they were kids before he moved away.  Ramona starts feeling for him, and she is suddenly confused because she thought she was only into girls. There's a lot of talk in this book about how sex and gender can be really fluid for many people, which is something that honestly helped me with my own sexuality. 
Synopsis: 
Ramona was only five years old when Hurricane Katrina changed her life forever. Since then, it’s been Ramona and her family against the world. Standing over six feet tall with unmistakable blue hair, Ramona is sure of three things: she likes girls, she’s fiercely devoted to her family, and she knows she’s destined for something bigger than the trailer she calls home in Eulogy, Mississippi. But juggling multiple jobs, her flaky mom, and her well-meaning but ineffectual dad forces her to be the adult of the family. Now, with her sister, Hattie, pregnant, responsibility weighs more heavily than ever. The return of her childhood friend Freddie brings a welcome distraction. Ramona’s friendship with the former competitive swimmer picks up exactly where it left off, and soon he’s talked her into joining him for laps at the pool. But as Ramona falls in love with swimming, her feelings for Freddie begin to shift too, which is the last thing she expected. With her growing affection for Freddie making her question her sexual identity, Ramona begins to wonder if perhaps she likes girls and guys or if this new attraction is just a fluke. Either way, Ramona will discover that, for her, life and love are more fluid than they seem.

 Princess Dennaleia and Princess Amaranthine 

Denna and Mare from Of Fire and Stars by Audrey Coulthurst is probably one of my favorite LGBTQ+ books I've ever read. It's about Denna, a princess who is betrothed to the prince of Mynaria, but she falls herself falling in love with the prince's sister, Mare. It's such a fun read and the romance is one of my favorite romances I've read. 
Synopsis: 
Betrothed since childhood to the prince of Mynaria, Princess Dennaleia has always known what her future holds. Her marriage will seal the alliance between Mynaria and her homeland, protecting her people from other hostile lands. But Denna has a secret. She possesses an Affinity for fire—a dangerous gift for the future queen of a kingdom where magic is forbidden. Now, Denna must learn the ways of her new home while trying to hide her growing magic. To make matters worse, she must learn to ride Mynaria’s formidable warhorses—and her teacher is the person who intimidates her most, the prickly and unconventional Princess Amaranthine—called Mare—the sister of her betrothed. When a shocking assassination leaves the kingdom reeling, Mare and Denna reluctantly join forces to search for the culprit. As the two become closer, Mare is surprised by Denna’s intelligence and bravery, while Denna is drawn to Mare’s independent streak. And soon their friendship is threatening to blossom into something more. But with dangerous conflict brewing that makes the alliance more important than ever, acting on their feelings could be deadly. Forced to choose between their duty and their hearts, Mare and Denna must find a way to save their kingdoms—and each other.

Thanks for reading!