A recent issue of Real Simple magazine featured an article where writers, artists, and other influences described a fictional female character who really helped shaped them as people. Responses ran the gamut from literary heroines and television characters, and even included some whom I would choose as well. I thought I would chime in with a list of my own here, to pay homage to the girls and women who aren't just my favorites, but who actually made me ME. Ramona Quimby Aside from Disney fairy tales, Ramona books are some of the earliest books I remember reading and getting REALLY into. (I read all the books, I listened to audiobooks, and I even borrowed videotapes of the tv show from the library.) I guess I was "in the fandom" before I knew anything about the idea of being in a fandom. The Quimby household felt very different from mine at that age, when I felt "more Vietnamese" than I did as I got older, but so much of what eventually became my worldv
