This week on Top Five Wednesday, Chelsey and I talk about the top five fictional items we want. How many times have you been reading a book and you’ve come across an object (magical or otherwise) and wished that it existed in the real world? The items on this list would either make life easier or add a little bit more fun to our day to day adventures. We really want them.
As you can guess, this list was easy to put together. Too easy in fact. For the first time in a long time we had a hard time narrowing down which items to include on our list. We decided to include two honourable mentions, because we wanted to talk about them.
Top Five Wednesday is a book tag started by GingerReadsLainey. Join the goodreads group to get each week’s topic and participate yourselves!
Honourable Mentions
The Moving Tattoos from The Uglies Series – Scott Westerfeld
These tattoos can move and change based off of different things: your mood, some pre-decided pattern, the weather or any other reason you could think of. The more we think about it, the more fun you could have with it. You could have a tattoo of a tree on your forearm that changes with the passing of seasons; or you could have a tattoo a vine that grows up your arm as the day progresses. Anything is possible, only our creativity is your limit.
The Ouroboros Ouzo – Ouroboros Ouzo – Jonathan L. Howard
In the short story Ouroboros Ouzo, Johannes Cabal drinks the titicular liquor and gets to meet all the alternate future versions of himself. Among those he encounters, Cabal meets all the version of himself who never becomes a necromancer and the version of himself who somehow becomes a woman. Imagine meeting every version of yourself. It would be interesting to see how different personality traits come to the forefront of all your different versions.
I like to think that somewhere out there, there is a Mad Max-esque version of myself and I would really love to talk to them.
THE TOP FIVE FICTIONAL ITEMS WE WANT (FROM BOOKS)
5. Kell’s Coat from A Darker Shade of Magic – V.E. Schwab
Both Chelsey and I agreed on wanting this item instantly. Kell’s coat is twelve or more coats folded intoone.
Kell wore a very peculiar coat. It had neither one side, which would be conventional, nor two, which would be unexpected, but several, which was, of course, impossible… The first thing he did whenever he stepped out of one London and into another was take off the coat and turn it inside out once or twice (or even three times) until he found the side he needed. Notall of them were fashionable, but they each served a purpose. There were ones that blended in and ones that stood out, and one that served no purpose but of which he was just particularly fond.
Kell doesn’t know how many different coats are part of his coat. Every once in a while he finds a new one, or comes across one he hasn’t seen in a long time. It’s such a cool concept and we just absolutely adore it. Kell’s coat is one of the first things you are introduced to in this series and it sets the stage for the rest of the weird and wonderful things you come across in the rest of the story.
Imagine leaving something in your pockets and the frantic attempt to refind it.
We did a review on A Darker Shade of Magic, which you can watch here.
4. The Subtle Knight or The Golden Compass from His Dark Materials – Philip Pullman
How sick would it be to be able to travel through parallel universes? Not to mention the knife can cut through absolutely anything, making it easy to defend yourself from any sort of danger on your travels (think Spectres). Then there is also the alethiometer (also called the golden compass). If you know how to read it, you can ask it any question and it will give you the true answer. Also it can communicate with angels, but it’s not like that’s really that important… right?
Chelsey and I did a look back on The Golden Compass, you can watch the video here.
3. The Abhorsen Bells from The Abhorsen Series – Garth Nix
When I first read Sabriel and was introduced to the idea of the Abhorsen… I really really wanted to be the Abhorsen. It was the dream. The Abhorsen spends their time going on adventures, combating necromancers and free magic creatures. It sounded both terrifying and amazing. The concept of how the magic worked in this word, through the mixture of music and symbols fascinated me. The Abhorsen’s tool of the trade are these bells. When rung, each bell does a specific thing from summoning to banishing to even killing all who hear it (even the one ringing it).
The world of Abhorsen is one I would live in, no question. Chelsey’s a little bit more skeptical about it.. but I expect she could be won over.
Chelsey and I did a review of Clariel, the most recent book in the Aborsen series. You can watch it here.
2. The Keys from Locke and Key -Joe Hill
These keys would be a lot of fun. Each key does something different, from giving you wings, to turning you into a giant or to swapping your gender. Who wouldn’t want to give them a try? Then there are a few keys that are kind of scary: one key causes you to be able to open up your head and look inside. What you find tends to look something like this:
Inside you find little representations of your personality traits. Think of Inside Out but on some scary party drugs. You can remove these little things or add them back at will. One of the subplots of Locke and Key is focused on how one character no longer wants to be able to feel fear, so she pulls fear out of her brain… along with the ability to cry, just for good measure.
There are so many ways to use these keys, and the series goes about it so creatively. If you haven’t read Locke and Key, we highly recommend it.
1. The Marauders Map from Harry Potter – J.K. Rowling
Even if I wasn’t at Hogwarts and I had the Marauders Map, I would find uses for it. I can totally see myself pulling it out at work to check up on what’s currently going down at Hogwarts. It would be the equivalent of magical reality TV. Granted if I was actually at Hogwarts and had the map that would be the best. I can’t say how much trouble I would manage to get myself into… It wouldn’t be pretty.
There you have it, our top five fictional items we want and our two honourable mentions. There are still plenty of other things we wouldn’t mind having… like a Firebolt or a lightsaber, but those are for another list, sometime in the future… probably. What are your top five picks for this list? Tell us about them in the comments below and until next time: Happy Reading!
