Until I heard about Robin McKinley in a Babysitter’s Club Book (really) every single fantasy novel I picked up until the age of 14 was about some teen boy finding out he had a destiny. Every single one!

April 09, 2026 - 02:50 UTC

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Or if it was a female protagonist, it was how she learned how to make musical instruments. No shade since that is literally one of my favourite subsects of fantasy, but still, child of destiny versus vaguely orphaned character learns how to make a wooden flute.
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Hey now, sometimes she was also a bitch
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Captain Scirocco Jones and her sidekick Gabrielle were written by a man but to be fair, everybody on the planet they crashed on were named after musical instruments.
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I loved those books, no regrets!
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I mean the Babysitters Club books, to be clear
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And all the female protagonists in fantasies were so angsty or edgy. Like, they thought the only reason why they thought people would read about a girl was if she "wasn't like other girls" siiiigghhhhhh I have never read a book where the girl mc is funny or fun in any way really
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Exactly!
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The Blue Sword!
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Yes!
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I eventually pawed around and found my way to L’Engle, McKillip, Butler, and Le Guin, but you had to HUNT.
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And I love Earthsea, but that book really is about a boy and he really does have a destiny in it.
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Ah yes, fantasy and sci-fi, two genres that were historically feminine?!?!?!?!?
What’s you’re favorite McKillip novel bc I don’t have an immediate answer
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“manosphere”

“mantasy”

THESE ARE ALL NAMES FOR GAY CLUBS.
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And McKillip's books were always so difficult to find!
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The real man-tasy was … the sci fi and fantasy we had all along.
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Ugh... The hero's quest.

My childhood was full of Tolkien reboots too. (MInd you, some of them were great, but fantasy lit can be so much richer.)
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