Get Up Offa That Slump: Inspirational, Badass, and Strong Women in Fiction

Today for this blogging extravaganza, I'm going to talk about three of my favorite strong and inspirational women in fiction! International Women's Day was on March 8th, so this is a fantastic

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My number one for this is going to be Daenerys Targaryen from Game of Thrones. I have not yet read the books, but I am in the middle of season three of the TV show right now and I just think that she is SO KICKASS!

She starts off in most unfortunate situation with her brother basically selling her off to the highest bidder in exchange for an army to reclaim the Iron Throne. She is forced to marry the leader of the Dothraki people and then to perform whatever kind of... consummation acts he wishes... :(

But then it's like she just decides to not take that crap anymore and she really impresses the Dothraki people and starts to own her situation and turn it around to suit her. After her brother gets taken out of the picture and her husband tragically passes, she leads whatever Dothraki people will still follow her and decides to go reclaim the throne that is rightfully hers (I love a story where a queen has to go reclaim her rightful throne so maybe that's part of why I love her so much). She mothers some dragons and she goes to acquire an army and ships and she strikes down anyone in her path that tries to hold her back or wrong her. She's good to her people and to other innocent people and just is all around strong, badass, and inspirational. I want to be her.

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My next fictional and inspirational badass is Ruby Daly from The Darkest Minds! I can't sing enough praises for this book, I absolutely adore it in every way and I LOVE Ruby!

Ruby starts off scared, which is really understandable. She was taken, at the age of ten, to a rehabilitation camp for children who ended up with powers. And when she got off the bus, she realized that the power she ended up with was not one that was good to have. So she used her orange powers to convince everyone that she was a green and then promptly put a stopper on her powers so as not to cause any problems.

When she escapes years later, she is still scared. She is scared of her powers and scared of the people who rescued her and just basically everything. But after meeting up with the Black Betty crew, she makes friends and learns to master her power and generally becomes more confident. Then she goes on to make a REALLY tough choice to keep the love of her life safe and joins people that she isn't positive have the best intentions of the children in mind and throughout everything she manages to help liberate two camps I think? Including the one that she was stuck in. She comes a loooong way from the scared girl that she was to become the BADASS heroine that she is and I LOVE her!

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And the third character that I'm going to talk about is Sharzhad from The Wrath and the Dawn! She is awesome, awesome, awesome.

She volunteers to be the next wife of Khalid, the Caliph of Khorasan, even though she knows everyday he takes a new wife and kills her. She volunteers to be his wife for the chance to seek revenge for him killing her best friend. Even though she knows what is bound to happen, she is determined to stay alive. And she manages to stay alive night after night, but she ends up seeing a part of Khalid that no one really knows about and despite everything, falls in love with him. She's sassy, strong, determined, and utterly just awesome!

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Who are some of YOUR favorite badass women in fiction?