Read or Dream - Characters

Characters

The Sisters appear to be named after Michelle Yeoh, Anita Mui and Maggie Cheung, the stars of the classic Hong Kong action film The Heroic Trio.

Michelle Cheung

Michelle is the eldest sister at age 23. She considers herself the group leader, accepting missions and devising tasks for the Paper Sisters to undertake. Being the only legal adult in the family, she is Anita's legal guardian. She is much like Read or Die's Yomiko Readman in that she is naively carefree about many things, and she spends all the money she has, including the house money, to buy every book she comes across. Unlike Yomiko, however, she is very outgoing and talkative. She serves as a strong contrast to her other sisters, being talkative and peppy (unlike shy Maggie) and calm and collected (unlike spitfire Anita). She helps earn the sisters extra money (quickly spent) doing translation work; however, otherwise Michelle is often lazy and needs to be coerced into helping around the house.

Michelle's paper mastery is focused on the creation of paper projectiles; most often she fires paper arrows with a paper longbow. These arrows are as dangerous, if not more so, as real arrows, and Michelle can also twist them into different shapes to wrap around her targets. Michelle carries an aluminum case full of different kinds of paper for the Sisters to access during combat.

Maggie Mui

Maggie is the middle sister, age 19. Michelle describes her as "Big, Strong and Sharp!" She is shy and quiet, preferring to let her sisters speak for the group, although she will speak up if she feels she has something important to say. She, like her sister Michelle, loves books, and little can distract her once she is absorbed in a book. She loves small spaces (despite her large stature, she is often found reading under a table or in a window sill) and tends to have a somewhat depressive nature, often questioning her value to her other two sisters (who will quickly reassure her if they find she is upset). She is the sisters' primary cook. Maggie has very few friends, but does bond with a young blind girl named Faye whom Maggie encourages to get an operation so she can see again.

In combat, Maggie creates the strongest paper shields, and she can create paper "familiars" or marionettes to attack or defend as she wills. Her most common puppets include a wolf with great attack prowess, a strong golem which lifts heavy things and destroys obstacles, and a giant bird for transport.

Anita King

Youngest of the three sisters, 12-year-old Anita is brash and outspoken. She is also the most practical and is forever trying to get Maggie and Michelle to save some money for food. She also collects things with frogs on them, an obsession which is reinforced by her sisters' and other friends' frequent frog gifts to her. Unlike her sisters, she hates books, a dramatic difference from most other papermasters; Michelle says this is because Anita is going through a rebellious phase, though it may also have something to do with how Anita was "created" by Dokusensha, and because of a traumatic experience caused by a fire at the great library caused by Yomiko Readman. In volume 4, a "passing book lover" notes that if Anita truly had no interest in books, she wouldn't even bother to hate them, and notes that books have led her to her sisters and her dearest friends. Anita is good friends with Chihon and Hisami.

She is best at using paper to cut, able to slice through rocks and steel, and uses paper as a short blade or short-range thrown weapon. Anita is also an agile, skilled martial artist and often uses her paper skills to supplement her impressive physical prowess.

Chihon

The sisters meet Chihon when he is seeking a mysterious library to return a book on behalf of his deceased grandfather. He later befriends Anita and helps her on numerous occasions; though they often have arguments they also care for one another. He aspires to be an author.

Mr. Tsai;

A bookstore owner, Mr. Tsai aids the sisters many times, especially Anita.

Lily the Reader Extraordinaire

This young woman steals rare books, and gets Anita wrapped up in one of her book theft plots, and later tries to kidnap Hisami. Lily is often overly and pushily affectionate towards Anita and Hisami, intimating that she is a pedophile. She keeps a pet panther named "Orion."

Hisami Hishishii

Hisami is a 13-year-old author from Japan who befriends the Paper Sisters after they protect her from Lily. Anita and Hisami especially bond, particularly when Anita goes to school with Hisami in Japan. Hisami's classmate Tohru has a crush on her.