Daja Named One of “Ten Empowering Female Characters in Children’s Books”

Daja gets some recognition from Guardian readers as she makes the list of Ten Empowering Female Characters in Children’s Books! Regarding her impact, Hannah Catteral says:

She has a strong sense of justice and hard work, and is always a champion for her friends. She apprentices to an older blacksmith, Frostpine, who teaches her skilled and magical metalwork, and eventually becomes a master of her craft.

In later books, as she grows older, she also falls in love with a woman, and this is treated as perfectly normal. Having grown up with Daja, her friends and their adventures, this was absolutely wonderful and unprecedented for childrens’ series at the time.