All-stars – BELINDA CRAWFORD

Alanna of Trebond – a childhood hero

October 15, 2012 by Belinda Crawford

I first devoured the Song of the Lioness series when I was ten; to say that it was my favourite set of books ever is to understate the case. Alanna, the series protagonist, was my childhood hero, and not just because she had a magic sword and a talking cat. Alanna was my hero because she was doing something forbidden and getting away with it.

It wasn’t an especially bad thing that she was doing, like selling drugs or stealing, she was just doing what the boys did – playing with swords, riding horses, going to war – and if that meant she had to lie about her gender, well, that only added to the tension.

John Crichton – mad, bad and dangerous to know

October 1, 2012 by Belinda Crawford

More anti-hero than hero, Crichton makes the all-star list more for his journey from squeaky clean good guy to interstellar, slightly insane, bad boy than any other trait.

K’Ehleyr – The Targ that ate the canary

March 20, 2012 by Belinda Crawford

Portrait of Ambassador K’Ehleyr — Ambassador K’Ehleyr

Targ – a boar-like creature with spikes along it’s back. Generally considered to be the Klingon equivalent of a cat.

At 5’9” with a forehead that looks like it could deflect a sledgehammer this all-star isn’t someone you’d like to encounter in a dark alley. Half-Klingon, half-human and a good deal more attractive than the former, K’Ehleyr gets to be the first shuttle off my all-star hero rank because it’s hard to go past a woman who can take the piss out of Worf ((She’s also my favourite Star Trek character, but only if you exclude Chris Pine as Captain Kirk.)).