Heroines who remind me of girls I knew in high school, Part TWO

Why am I doing this? See part ONE below.

Savi Murray: (Demon Moon by Meljean Brook)
Savi reminds me of that rare kind of girl who was liked by kids from all walks of life—burnouts, the nerdy smart set, even the jocks, (thanks to her fake ID selling business for the fictional Savi). She’s the girl who spent most of her time in the computer lab (when I went to high school, kids didn’t have their own computers to bring). Savi is one of the smarter heroines I read, which is highly enjoyable. In classes, the Savi type of girl I'm specifically thinking about was a bit of a screw off, only because she was bored by the lessons, being that she already knew everything. You can sometimes find a Savi type of girl in band, playing a more outrageous instrument like tuba or drums. And if bagpipes were allowed in band, she would probably go for that. Never flute.

Anita Blake (Anita Blake, Vampire Slayer by Laurel K. Hamilton)
In high school, Anita was one of those girls other kids didn’t understand, skulking around the halls in black. Really goal-oriented and tough and serious, and maybe a bit judgmental. I was slightly in awe of the Anita I’m thinking of, and I would’ve liked to know her better, but I if actually socialized her, I doubt she would’ve had much patience with me - she would’ve thought I goofed around too much, like I wasn’t a really serious person. Anita had precisely one friend, and together they had their own private, rich, interesting world. They could frequently be found doing interesting projects with some hip teacher.

Margrit Knight (Heart of Stone, C.E. Murphy)
I had a friend like Margrit—the serious smart girl who wins all the awards, and a member of a lot of clubs, on the paper and all that. We scheduled classes together, like German, where she was the star. We were also on track team and tennis team, where we had weird little private jokes. She had excellent taste in music and a slight weight fixation. My Margrit was sensible, reasonable, mature and fun. This Margrit type makes for a strong, totally admirable heroine.

Jezebel (Hell’s Belles by Jackie Kessler)
Jezebel was a girl I secretly watched and tried to copy in the fashion department, with dismal results. She smoked in the bathroom and sucked at gym class, math and all other classes, not that she cared. The Jezebel type I’m thinking of would seek out a more studious girl like me out around test time, begging for me to explain stuff to her, because she blew off class and homework. And I would help her and explain things to her, just to be near her, hoping she’d rub off on me a little bit. The Jezebel I remember was on the sexy dance squad, and then she was kicked off the sexy dance squad. An enjoyable heroine to read about.

Gargoyles!

Great Moments from last night's reading
Book: Heart of Stone
Author: C. E. Murphy
Spoiler level: low

You walk by a big old building and look up at a gargoyle and think, what if that thing came alive and flew around at night? What if it only just now froze and pretended to be a statue, but as soon as I look away, it will fly somewhere? That's the situation in Heart of Stone, where author C.E. Murphy has created a wonderful shadow world of 'Old Races,' and gargoyles are one of them. Alban, the gargoyle hero here, gets the prize for the coolest shifted form, as well as for being incredibly nice.

I love the moments where people are first putting things together, where the paranormal bleeds into the normal. My great moment from last night's reading was when our heroine, Margrit, is with this not-yet-believing fellow, and they're looking out the window and they see a gargoyle on a high ledge, and she's like, was there a gargoyle there before? He thinks surely there was. But then later, there isn't one there at all. Ooops.

There are five Old Races - dragons, djinn, vampires, gargoyles and the weird selkies, sort of like sea lion people. Actually, all five of the categories spend much of their time in human form. And in the case of the dragon and the djinn, they spend time in human forms that have a bit of the batman villain in them, and I mean that in the most positive sense possible.