Favorite Fictional Character --- Polgara the Sorceress

I decided that April will be the month to showcase, briefly, some of my favorite female fantasy characters.  Fantasy has long been a genre that has done well at presenting strong female characters, so the choosing of only four is going to be a bit hard to do.  This week I'm going with one of David Edding's iconic characters, Polgara the Sorceress.

When I first met Polgara, I was a slightly nerdy (but still cool) kid in high school who was just starting to fall in love with fantasy.  She was beautiful, intelligent, and thousands of years old.  What's not to love about that combination.

Polgara started out in life as one of twin daughters born to her father Belgarath and her mother Poledra.  Belgarath was one of the most powerful sorcerers around and Poledra was a wolf that had learned to take human form when she chose to.  Now with such great parents you would think that Polgara would have had a wonderful childhood.  Instead her mother faked her own death to fulfill a prophecy, her father was never around, and the twins were raised by two of Belgarath's fellow sorcerers.

Skip ahead a few thousand years and you will find Polgara protecting generation after generation of the Rivan royal family in order to one day see one of them sit on the throne once again and defeat the evil god Torak.    One that boy is born, Garion later know as Belgarion, it's up to Polgara, her father, and those who have been prophesied to protect him, to make sure he fulfills his destiny.

This journey is told throughout ten different books, an "autobiographical" book about herself, and her father's "autobiography".  One I got started on these books I quickly realised what a fantastic character she truly is.  She is loyal and protective of those she loves, and she loves hard.   Despite her age, magic, and intelligence she is quick of temper and has no problem forcing those around her to go the way she wants them to.  she is willful,  stubborn, and willing to compromise all at the same time.  She is one of the most well drawn characters in fantasy and she is one of the reasons why I fell in love with the genre so much.

I would encourage everyone to get started on these books by David Eddings as soon as you can.  Inside them you will meet Polgara and a whole host of other remarkable characters, both good and evil.  You would start with the first 5 books of The Belgariad series, move on with the 5 books of The Malloreon series, then finish with Belgarath: The Sorcerer and Polgara: The Sorceress.  If you decide to take the journey, you won't be disappointed.  Trust me, these book and their characters are way more interesting than this meager post of mine can every get across.