Your librarian sounds awesome. I'm a sucker for librarian characters.

Gender and race balance is something more stories should have, when it wouldn't be inappropriate and forced. Maybe I should take up a similar challenge.. but try to come up with a story with half a dozen or more female characters as the main action. It'd at least force me to make them all different from each other. Hopefully without copying Sailor Moon too much. ;)

You're right on there with the characters not reflecting me as a reader. I have a real disconnect with the 'typical' woman, portrayed not just in fiction, but in the media and everywhere. My favorite female characters tended to be the ones who were readers. Because at least I was a reader too.