Madeleine L'Engle: A Heroine Worth Emulating

I have a new favorite author. She wrote this:

The Wrinkle in Time quintet

“We are all strangers in a strange land, longing for home, but not quite knowing what or where home is. We glimpse it sometimes in our dreams, or as we turn a corner, and suddenly there is a strange, sweet familiarity that vanishes almost as soon as it comes.” 
― Madeleine L'Engle

Read all her quotes on goodreads.

My six-year-old and I are in the middle (well, maybe a quarter of the way into it) of A Wrinkle in Time, reading aloud. The writing during the part when they're "tesser"ing to Uriel made me swoon, so I decided to look up some of the quotes on goodreads. What I found surprised me. There are many, many quotes by her that have nothing to do with A Wrinkle in Time. She's written over SIXTY books. 

SIXTY! 

That's phenomenal. And many of her books seem to be realistic fiction, like Meet the Austins. So she wasn't restricted to one genre.

Here I am trying to write one amazing book. I mean, yes, I've written six sub-par books, but this woman wrote SIXTY books. Books that were read by lots and lots of people. She had critics. Everybody does. But she just kept writing.

*hero worship eyes*

Who are your literary heroes?

Why My Baby is My Hero (and should be yours, too)

© Carbouval | Dreamstime.com


My baby is my hero.

He's got more going on than my current protagonist, who is fighting evil in his own family, and trying to gain control over his very sporadic powers.

You don't believe me?

Listen to this compilation of misery:

TEETHING

• swollen gums 
• sore mouth 
• compulsion to chew on anything in sight

COLD VIRUS

• runny nose 
• sore throat
• mouth breathing vs. hunger (can't eat and breathe at the same time)
• scratchy tissue paper assault courtesy of mom

FIRST STOVE TOP BURN

• exposed sensitive skin
• poky toys
• compulsion to grab things causing pain

BIG BROTHER

• thinks he's a toy
• tries to carry him
• steamrolls him
• takes away his toys

DIAPERS

• poop; need I say more?

SLEEPY

• near-constant need for sleep

Okay, I'll stop there, but I'm sure he's feeling other things I can't put my finger on as an outside observer. The amazing thing is that he's laughing, and cruising along furniture as we speak. I'm pretty sure he's eating California right now (USA wooden puzzle). But he's happy.

It got me thinking about two things:

1. My baby is amazing! He's resilient. He's perky. He's way tougher than I'll ever be. I mean, I'm sick right now, and I'm being a total baby (obviously not) about it. He's just going on with his quest of learning to walk. And that's plain heroic.

2. The hero of my current WIP is weak sauce compared with Baby LJ. And I could learn something about characterization by looking at what an actual, real-life hero deals with on a daily basis. We are what we do, right? LJ is a hardcore survivor type. My protag is a sissy la la. Maybe if I gave him a few more external problems (big brother, teething, diapers) and a solid internal dilemma (compulsion to stick everything in his mouth), he'd make for a rounder, more developed character.

Food for thought, people. I'm off to make my fictional hero more like an 8-month-old.