{"id":1503,"date":"2010-07-06T07:00:47","date_gmt":"2010-07-06T11:00:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/?p=1503"},"modified":"2010-07-06T07:00:47","modified_gmt":"2010-07-06T11:00:47","slug":"characters-youd-let-your-daughter-date","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/?p=1503","title":{"rendered":"Characters You’d Let Your Daughter Date"},"content":{"rendered":"

My cousin and her family came to visit last week, and I kept thinking of great guys I wanted to introduce to my cousin’s 16-year-old daughter, Calyn. The problem was, most of the guys were fictional.
\nThere are a lot of great guys in YA lit. I’d really love for Calyn to meet the wildly original, open-hearted, sweet Nawat from Tamora Pierce’s Trickster’s Choice<\/em>, for instance. In fact, just about any of the male heroes in Pierce’s books would do; George, the robber king from The Song of the Lioness<\/em> cycle is my other fave. I’d happily introduce Calyn to Owen from Sarah Dessen’s Just Listen<\/em>, Max from Cecil Castellucci’s Boyproof<\/em>, Zach from Nancy Werlin’s Impossible<\/em>, John from Ellen Wittlinger’s Hard Love<\/em>.
\nI’d support dates with Jasper from Jean Webster’s Daddy-Long-Legs<\/em>, or Stephen from Dodie Smith’s I Capture the Castle<\/em>. And I’d love to be in-laws with Hilary McKay’s Casson family, in case Calyn found herself pairing up with Indigo. Since I’m a generous soul, I’d even allow her to date my own first literary crush: Aragorn (do I need to explain that this is Tolkien’s character from The Lord of the Rings<\/em>? I didn’t think so.) Ah, Aragorn. *sigh*
\nWhen I raised the question of literary dating with Calyn herself, she admitted to a current crush on Colin in John Green’s An Abundance of Katherines<\/em> (I have a soft spot for his lazy, funny best friend, Hassan).
\nAs for suitors I’d forbid from Calyn’s doorstep: at the top of the list is Heathcliff (who was my own weakness at 18; by 30, I knew better).
\nSo let me ask you: What characters in literature would you want your daughter to date? And whom would you never let her near?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

My cousin and her family came to visit last week, and I kept thinking of great guys I wanted to introduce to my cousin’s 16-year-old daughter, Calyn. The problem was, most of the guys were fictional. There are a lot of great guys in YA lit. I’d really love for Calyn to meet the wildly […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1503","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1503","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1503"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1503\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1503"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1503"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1503"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}