What's the Name of That Book??? discussion

I'm looking for books in which a character is mean or bad, but people mistakenly think he or she is kind and good, or don’t know that they’re bad and treat them like a human being, and this makes the character want to live up to it. For examples, Little Lord Fauntleroy and The Mouse and His Child, in which the villains are treated as good people and so become so. Also in The Willoughbys, in which the kids start out pretty bad, but their badness isn't discovered and can be forgotten. All genres are welcome, especially children's and fantasy.
Thank you.

A Christmas Carol



This classic has been adapted many different times. If you are looking for a younger reader, consider these alternatives to the original text (or along with the original text).

Some of the minor characters in The False Prince are examples of this.

LauraW wrote: "Some of the minor characters in The False Prince are examples of this."
Thank you, I'll check it out.

JCLHeatherM wrote: "A Christmas Carol



This classic has been adapted many different times. If you are looking for a younger reader, consider these alternatives to the or..."
Thank you, I've read this classic.

Bump. I guess I should have chosen a snappier title.

It's a play, but Bertold Brecht's The Caucasian Chalk Circle has an example of this. A character (not a villain, but a normal person without particular heroic qualities) is mistaken for a hero of the revolution and appointed as a judge. He proceeds to actually be an effective and fair-minded judge, and resolves the central conflict of the play's climax.

Another borderline example is the protagonist of Michael Moorcock's The War Hound and the World's Pain. At the start of the book, he's a thoroughly amoral mercenary who started out fighting for his religion but quickly lost his idealism and, by his own admission, has done awful things. He isn't so much mistaken for a hero as given a "holy" task, but it (plus falling in love) seems to make him a better person.

Thanks! I saw a performance of The Caucasian Chalk Circle and liked it very much. I've borrowed the Moorcock book.

I saw this in a few books about kids in foster care who were hurt and acting out:
The Language of Flowers
Pictures of Hollis Woods


Seabiscuit: An American Legend
The jockey was angry and getting into fights, and the horse was too in some ways. There is a lot going on in this story, but in my mind, this is a story about 3 broken men and a broken horse, who put each other back together.

I love the concept of self-fulfilling prophesy, so I'll try to think of more examples. It works in negative ways too. (If you treat someone like they can't be trusted, they might live down to your negative expectations.)

Thank you, Nancy J! I've read Flowers, and I've heard good things about the other two. But I'm looking only for positive examples.

Dragon on a Pedestal, by Piers Anthony. It's a fantasy, where one character is a young child with the magical talent to make people/monsters into what she perceives them to be--and she perceives them to be very good, smart, etc. It's in a series, but you don't need to have read the previous books. Dragon on a Pedestal

And, there is always Anne of Green Gables, in which Anne begins her life as an unwanted orphan, but becomes a young woman, who strives for good, because she is loved and cared for.

Ogre, Ogre is another one in the same series that Pamela suggested. In it the MC (a part Ogre) turns out to be smart and heroic because the others in his quest group think that he is.

Thank you all! I've read Anne, but she was never bad or mediocre in the first place. The others I will look up.

I tried to search for more positive examples, but most lay people use the term only in a negative sense, and focus on actual "prophesies" e.g. in Harry Potter or Oedipus. You might find more positive examples in books with good managers or good sports coaches.

But this looks like the process you're talking about...


Character as Moral Fiction
Everyone wants to be virtuous, but recent psychological investigations suggest that this may not be possible. Mark Alfano challenges this theory and asks, not whether character is empirically adequate, but what characters human beings could have and develop. Although psychology suggests that most people do not have robust character traits such as courage, honesty and open-mindedness, Alfano argues that we have reason to attribute these virtues to people because such attributions function as self-fulfilling prophecies - children become more studious if they are told that they are hard-working and adults become more generous if they are told that they are generous. He argues that we should think of virtue and character as social constructs: there is no such thing as virtue without social reinforcement. His original and provocative book will interest a wide range of readers in contemporary ethics, epistemology, moral psychology and empirically informed philosophy.

In both A Man Called Ove and Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine, the protagonists are anti-social, judgmental and grumpy, but a new neighbor and a co-worker (respectively) treat them as though they they are nice, generous, and want to be helpful. I loved both of these books.

The story about Eleanor has one or two similarities to Language of Flowers.

There was another example in Salt to the Sea, where a character wants to be selfish and stay away from others, but they expect him to help the group and he eventually lives up to their expectations. (I didn't like this book very much though.)

Another book where one of the characters starts out not well liked but, because of the perceptions of the others as well as what is happening to them, he gradually changes. But he's a very minor character who only appears in a few scenes in the book. (It's also YA) Invitation to the Game This book is also very popular--or at least is well remembered. We've had a lot of people come to the group searching for it.

Chloe, Queen of Denial has this happen to the MC. But she'd also decided to try to be brave after being scared of everything for most of her life. This is YA

Thank you, Ann and NancyJ!

Damnation Alley by Roger Zelazney is about a not at all good man forced to drive a supply of desperately needed vaccine across post-apocalyptic America. His first instinct is to cut and run but he ends up fighting to succeed even when he doesn’t understand why.

Armor by John Steakley is about two different men. One agrees to betray people who care about him but later fights to protect them, the other throws himself into war to forget and die but ends up caring about others despite himself.

The Prince and the Pauper. The movie The Return of Martin Guerre.

I have to second Peter's suggestion of Damnation Alley. It was a really great story about a man who finds that he isn't as quite as much of a di** as he'd always thought himself to be.

And while we are at it--I just thought about The Postman. Again a man who starts out trying a con only to get caught up and changed by the image he'd started.

A sci-fi one is The X Factor. In this one, the MC is perceived as stupid and clumsy. But as the story progresses he discovers that he's much more than anyone--including himself--ever believed.

In The Time Traders (sci-fi) the MC starts out as a con and finds that the second chance he's been given is the best thing that's ever happened to him.

The Key of the Keplian in this the ones who have the change are the title creatures, the Keplians. This is a fantasy, and the Keplians are horse like beings who are intelligent and, at the start of the book totally evil. They aren't the MCs in this book, but do figure prominently in it.

Thank you, Peter, Damnation Alley sounds good. Thank you again, Ann, and you too, Michele. I've read The Prince and the Pauper and liked it very much.

For a book that goes the other way -- where a character deliberately takes on a new persona in an effort to change themselves -- you might try The New Lucinda. It's a "girls novel" from the 1950s so there is a certain datedness to it, but it's well written and Lucinda is a strong main character.

Any more suggestions?

Another person who deliberately takes on another persona to change herself, is the heroine of Daisy Summerfield's Style, by M.B. Goffstein Daisy Summerfield's Style

Thanks, Pamela. Did you find that book in this group? I saw the thread for it and put it on my maybe list. Now it’s on my to-read list.

No, actually I first read that book back in high school. I even bought a copy, which I still have.

You can also check on tv tropes page. They have listed a Becoming the Mask trope that pretty much fits your description and there are some interesting literature examples given.

Double StarDouble Star is a pretty good 1950's SF novel in which a down-and-out, alcoholic actor/conman is convinced to take the place of a temporarily missing politician...

Gillian's suggest for Double Star is a great read. But then, I love Robert A. Heinlein and his works.

Not quite what you're looking for, but the description and the review reminded me of this thread: The Melanie Pluckrose Effect.

Thanks, Ayshe! Sorry I didn't reply sooner. Bump.

Rosa wrote: "Thank you, Nancy J! I've read Flowers, and I've heard good things about the other two. But I'm looking only for positive examples."

I don't think I explained them well because they really are all positive examples that fit your question. Without giving spoilers, all the books had characters who were bad or acting bad - such as getting into fights and alienating people. And they all included one or more characters who saw the best in them, which helped them want to live up to the positive expectations.

For another example, Widge in The Shakespeare Stealer infiltrates the Globe theater troupe in order to steal the script of Hamlet, but finds himself being changed by the people around him, who believe in him and don’t know that he’s a thief-in-training. He makes his first friends.

The Scapegoat, maybe?

There's a Boy in the Girls' Bathroom

On my list of "Greatest books I don't think I could bear to read again."