LIT LISTS: Top ten dynamic duos in fiction

Monday, June 24, 2013

Top ten dynamic duos in fiction

Elizabeth Wein has lived in Scotland for over ten years and wrote nearly all her novels there. Her first five books for young adults are set in Arthurian Britain and sixth century Ethiopia. The most recent

of these form the sequence The Mark of Solomon, published in two parts as The Lion Hunter (2007) and The Empty Kingdom (2008). The Lion Hunter was short-listed for the Andre Norton Award for Best Young Adult Fantasy and Science Fiction in 2008.

Wein's more recent novels for teens mark a departure in a totally new direction. Code Name Verity is a World War II thriller in which two young girls, one a Resistance spy and the other a transport pilot, become unlikely best friends. Her latest book, Rose Under Fire, set towards the end of the second world war, also features a young heroine with plane-flying skills.

For the Guardian, Wein named her top ten dynamic duos in fiction, including:

Frodo Baggins and Sam Gamgee (The Lord of the Rings by JRR Tolkien)

I confess it - I read The Lord of the Rings 20 times when I was 14. Any subtext of class or sex that might mar this pairing for me as an adult went straight over my head when I was a teenager. Frodo was the love of my life, and his under-the-radar heroism in the face of cosmically proportioned evil shaped every character I've ever invented. It's true that I only really adored Sam because he also adored Frodo; but there's no doubt that without their teamwork the One Ring could never have been destroyed.

Read about the other entries on the list.