The Smashing & Dashing 2023 Character Awards

Happy almost-New-Year, bookworms! 

Here I am, squeaking right under the wire on the very last day of 2023 for that most ancient and venerable of annual traditions, the Smashing & Dashing Character Awards! Originally founded by C.G. Drews @Paper Fury, this tag is something I’ve decided to keep going because it’s such a fun way to look back over the year in books and celebrate your favorite characters. 

The only rule of the Smashing & Dashing Character Awards is that the characters chosen must come from books (or plays or comics or whatnot) you read this year, in 2023. However, they don’t need to be new releases published in 2023. Pick as many classics as you wish! 

If you want to learn more about these books, I’ve linked each entry to my Goodreads review–or the book’s Goodreads page in the few cases where I didn’t actually review it.

Without further ado, here are this year’s winners! 

1. Most Relatable Character

Don’t be alarmed, but my most relatable character in 2023 was… Murderbot, from The Murderbot Diaries by Martha Wells! And before you sigh and roll your eyes at my tendency to relate to violent characters, I’d just like to point out that Murderbot does very little murdering and spends most of its time watching TV, because dealing with people is exhausting, and making decisions (like whom to kill) is even more so.

(source)

Besides, that pesky little “protectiveness” trait wired into its computer brain makes it want to stand up for every helpless, clueless human it comes across…

2. Most Pure Animal Companion

There’s a longstanding tradition of me answering this question ironically, since I don’t read many books with adorable animal companions. So I’ll go with the giant kaiju from The Kaiju Preservation Society by John Scalzi, a wacky sci-fi adventure about an alternate dimension populated by raging Godzillaesque creatures and the scientists who eagerly study them. 

Much pure. Very cuteness. Wow. 

3. Fiercest Fighter

Ead Duryan, from The Priory of the Orange Tree by Samantha Shannon! Ead is the deadly assassin tasked with protecting Queen Sabran Berethnet who ends up falling in love with her instead. Obviously, I was very here for this gay royal romance, but I was also fascinated by Ead as a character in her own right. She hails from a convent of warrior nuns in a Middle-Eastern-inspired desert and draws supernatural strength and cunning from a magical orange tree (come on, aren’t you excited yet?) 

While Priory of the Orange Tree is very much “Game of Thrones but make it feminist and queer,” the fact that it was able to enchant ME, a confirmed epic fantasy/medieval fantasy hater, should tell you something. This book is worth the hype, guys. 

4. Am Surprised That I Loved You??

Inspector Grant from The Singing Sands by Josephine Tey. I was genuinely surprised by how much I liked Grant in this novel, because I’d tried reading another book in his series, Daughter of Time, and couldn’t get past the first few pages of his cynical, self-important narration. But the Alan Grant we see in The Singing Sands is a sadder and humbler man in the throes of a nervous breakdown, struggling to conceal his panic attacks from callous co-workers who (perhaps like his own former self?) have little sympathy for weakness. It’s a really interesting turnaround. 

5. Best Sassmaster

Count Alexander Rostov from A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles is very sassy indeed, in a mild-mannered, gentlemanly sort of way. He always gives the best comebacks to anyone who insults him… though it is perhaps doubtful whether they’re quick-witted enough to grasp his true meaning. :-P 

6. Best Antihero

That’s an easy choice–Thomas Fowler, from The Quiet American by Graham Greene. Fowler is absolutely an antihero rather than a hero; in every area of his life, from his marriage to his career to managing his addictions, he’s doing at least a few things wrong, and sometimes many things wrong. Let us never forget that his solution to the problem of “the quiet American” involves aIDING AND ABETTING MURDER. But Fowler’s redeeming point is that he understands the problem of the quiet American, and by extension the whole problem of American intervention in Vietnam, with a clear-sightedness few of his contemporaries can match. 

(actual footage of Fowler and Pyle)

7. The Best Friends Of All

Joe Kavalier and Sammy Clay, from The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay by Michael Chabon. These cousins and comrades-in-arms share a bond strong enough to transcend war, the Holocaust, PTSD, survivor’s guilt, and one of them marrying the other’s sweetheart (shhh, it works out in the end, I promise). 

Loosely based on the real-life artists who created Captain America, The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay is the best historical novel I’ve read in years. I highly, highly recommend it to anyone interested in World War II, Jewish culture, or comic books as an art form. 

8. Best Villain To Hate

While I don’t know that she was “objectively” the best villain to hate, I absolutely loathed Gretchen, the teenage villain of Imogen, Obviously by Becky Albertalli. She is so smug, so controlling, so narrow-minded, and so blissfully certain she knows everything about everybody else’s business at the tender age of eighteen. I just… Agh! I hated her! 

9. Best vs. Worst YA Parents

I don’t read a ton of YA anymore (being almost-thirty will do that to a girl), but I still read a few YA novels when they catch my eye. Of the YA parents I did encounter this year, the cream of the crop would probably be Bristal’s mom from A Long Stretch of Bad Days by Mindy McGinnis. She’s compassionate, understanding, yet tough as nails, one of the few people capable of bringing the semi-delinquent Bristal to heel. 

(And before you say “why does she have a semi-delinquent daughter if she’s such a fantastic parent??” THERE ARE SYSTEMIC FACTORS AT PLAY HERE, it’s a story about poverty and generational trauma, shhhhh) 

This year’s worst YA parent would definitely be Nigeria’s dad from Nigeria Jones by Ibi Zoboi. He’s a misogynistic cult leader, and I Did Not Care For Him.

10. Ship Of All Ships In 2023

I’m about to be basic as hell and name as my favorite ship of 2023 the hero and heroine of a run-of-the-mill historical romance I pulled off the library shelf out of pure boredom. But Maggie and Sam from When She Dreams by Amanda Quick really were “all that” for me. The author convinced me from page one that these characters were absolutely made for each other and no one else; and for a romance skeptic like me, that’s verrrryyyyy rare. No ridiculous fated mates nonsense, mind you–just two ordinary, jolly, sensible people whose little quirks and rough spots perfectly meshed with each other’s. 

Honorable mention goes to Ead and Sabran from The Priory of the Orange Tree. I wasn’t necessarily rooting for them at the beginning; their chemistry took a while to make itself felt… but once they got going, I can confirm the sparks did fly most satisfactorily. 

11. Most Precious Must Be Protected

It feels almost wrong–trivializing, perhaps?–to list these next characters in this category. Yet Rifkele and Manke from the play Indecent by Paula Vogel are indeed precious, and they do deserve to be protected. They’re two young, queer, Jewish girls facing a world of violent misogyny and homophobia. 

Indecent is especially fascinating because it’s a play-within-a-play. It’s about Sholem Asch’s 1906 drama God of Vengeance, the love story of Rifkele and Manke, which was banned for obscenity when it ran on Broadway in 1923. The Yiddish theater troupe which produced it spent years searching for an audience which would accept their art… while the shadow of the Holocaust loomed ever closer, and acceptance of any kind for Jews became harder and harder to find. 

12. Honestly Surprised You’re Still Alive

I am extremely surprised that James Wormold, the protagonist of Our Man in Havana by Graham Greene, is still alive. A bumbling vacuum salesman bluffing his way through high-stakes espionage? Come on!!! But also, TAKE MY MONEY–

13. Award For Making the Worst Decisions

Will the entire cast of Daisy Jones and the Six by Taylor Jenkins Reid please step forward?

14. Most In Need Of A Nap

W.P. Inman, from Cold Mountain by Charles Frazier, desperately needs a nap. He’s a Confederate deserter making his way through hundreds of miles of hostile territory on foot, in the hopes of seeing his beloved Cold Mountain once more. Throw in starvation, poorly treated war wounds, PTSD, and deep-seated guilt over having fought for a corrupt cause he no longer believes in, and no wonder the guy is exhausted.

(source)

15. Want To Read More About You

I would love to read more about Sergeant Pamela Lowell from Comes the War by Ed Ruggero. She’s such a delightful sidekick–practical, plucky, determined, yet showing glimpses of raw emotion–that I think a novel told from her point of view would be a real treat. 

~~~~

Well, there you have it, ladies and gentlemen… the illustrious winners for the Smashing & Dashing 2023 Character Awards! I know it’s already the last day of 2023, but if you have a hankering to choose your own answers and list your own favorites, feel free! A clean copy of the questions is below:

1. Most Relatable Character
2. Most Pure Animal Companion
3. Fiercest Fighter
4. Am Surprised That I Loved You??
5. Best Sassmaster
6. Best Antihero
7. The Best Friends Of All
8. Best Villain To Hate
9. Award for Best vs. Worst YA Parents
10. Ship Of All Ships In 2023
11. Most Precious Must Be Protected
12. Honestly Surprised You’re Still Alive
13. Award For Making the Worst Decisions
14. Most In Need Of A Nap
15. Want To Read More About You

What did you think of my choices? Have you read any of these books?

Chat with me!