Most memorable book character and why?

Most memorable book character and why?

Molly Carter comes to mind. She is just the most adorable female ever created. The Melting of Molly is her journal recording her efforts to lose twenty pounds.

She is a young widow who has helped raise her young neighbor, Billy:

“I haven't had Billy in my arms to-day and I don't know how I shall ever get myself to sleep if I let myself think about it. His sleep-place on my breast aches.”

The book was published in 1912 and is obscure, but available online.

>2 2wonderY: going to look that one up and see if I can add it to my TBR or WL!

It's free on Kindle for prime members.

The US and English versions differ right from the start. I recommend the US publication, at least for the first read.

I have two, from the same book, Rachel and Mary, who are two of only a handful survivors to survive a nuclear war on the west coast of the U.S. I admire them so because they were portrayed in such contrast to others in that they were moral and ethical, even putting the few Christians to shame in the novel A gift upon the Shore.

I’ll never forget Gertie Nevels, in The Dollmaker by Harriette Arnow. During WWII, Gertie and her children leave rural Kentucky to join her husband, who has taken a factory job in Detroit. She is wise and talented, unpretentious, struggling to fit into a world that is just about literally a foreign country to her. I have so much respect and admiration for her. She is faithfully and wonderfully portrayed by Jane Fonda in the excellent mini-series of the same name.

I feel like this is such a cliche but for me it’s Scarlett O’Hara from Gone With the Wind. She has so much gumption and even when she makes bad choices she never gives up!

>6 marell: Going on my WL!
>7 Penske: She was one strong woman!

I remember our mother reading us Treasure Island (RLS) round the fire on cold winter nights. OH Boy, I could just see Blind Pew and I did not want to meet him.
Long John Silver must be one of the most evocative characters to limp into pages and Ben Gunn fascinated me.
Everytime I read it, it feels new again.

Lisbeth Salander The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo in the Millennium series. She has too many problems to count but she meets them head on and triumphs. She is tenacious, feisty, and brilliant. I love quirky characters and she is a very quirky character.

>7 Penske: I don't think it's cliche at all. There's a reason that character is so iconic - she's flawed. Sometimes you like her, sometimes you loathe her, sometimes you pity her - but you always remember her. The book itself has become controversial, but that aside, a memorable character, among a strong cast of characters, was drawn.

>10 perennialreader: Great choice! Another very strong female lead.

In that same lane, I'll go with the otherwise unnamed Mrs. De Winter, the young heroine in Rebecca by Daphne Du Maurier. There is a hilarious sequence of her running through the hallways of the vast house, Manderley, when she is a new bride and literally panics when she realizes she is lost, and the servants turn their heads and watch her strangely as she gallops by. She realizes she looks idiotic to them but can't help herself, and it is a naive behavior many of us could identify with. Yet, she loves her mysterious new husband and stands by him throughout the novel, and becomes quite strong herself by the book's end. A character of great growth and depth, in a beautifully written novel.