Tough Travelling“Tough Traveling” is a weekly Thursday feature created by Nathan at Review Barn where participants make a new list each week based on The Tough Guide to Fantasyland by Diana Wynne Jones. This hilarious little book cheerfully pokes fun at the most prevalent tropes in fantasy. All are welcome to take part, and there is a link up over at his site. Join in any time!

This week’s trope is THE WEASEL

Weasels are usually very useful, obtaining information from unlikely sources and the like. For that matter they may be fun to be around. But can they ever really be trusted? Usually about as far as they can be thrown, but one never knows.

I feel like it goes without saying, but this post does have some mild spoilers. The weasels are named outright in my list, but rather than stating outright how they were weasel-y I just went with some very strong hints. Let’s get into it!

Harry Potter and the Half Blood PrinceSnape – The Harry Potter series by J.K. Rowling

Snape…he’s the classic weasel, isn’t he? Is he trying to kill Harry? Is he trying to kill Voldemort? He’s got some seriously important info (i.e. occlumency) that Harry needs to stand against the Dark Lord, but can he be trusted? So many questions! So few satisfactory answers.

 Catching FireFinnick – Catching Fire by Suzanne CollinsKatniss isn’t really sure what to make of Finnick when she first meets him. He seems like a kind of vapid party boy who’s bought into the opulence of the Capitol rather than a series contender for the games. But obviously there’s something more going on there, and it turns out that Finnick has a definite agenda when it comes to the Capitol…and to Katniss.
cover-stardustFerdy the Fence – Stardust by Neil GaimanFerdy is kind of a typical fence: he’ll sell anything, for a price…including information. Definitely a “play both sides” kind of person. He attempts to sell information on Yvaine and Tristan to the evil witch who’s after Yvaine’s heart. Never trust a fence!
The Calling by Kelley ArmstrongRafe – The Calling by Kelley ArmstrongRafe, Rafe, Rafe. What am I gonna do with you? First you wear a denim jacket with jeans, then you go around betraying people. I honestly can’t decide which is more unbecoming. But dude has the skinny on what’s going down with Maya’s strange supernatural abilities…and he’s not all bad, right? Whenever a YA novel features a mysterious, hot (debatable, but I digress) guy who’s new in town, you can basically guarantee that he’s got a bit of weasel in him.