Novel character, soft-hearted, surrounded by broken toys (5)
I believe the answer is:
topsy
'novel character' is the definition.
I don't know anything about this answer so I cannot tell whether this works.
'soft-hearted surrounded by broken toys' is the wordplay.
'soft-hearted' becomes 'p' (I am not sure about this - if you are sure you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
'surrounded by' indicates putting letters inside.
'broken' indicates an anagram.
'toys' anagrammed gives 'tosy'.
'p' put inside 'tosy' is 'TOPSY'.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for topsy that I've seen before include "character in Stowe" , "Girl in Uncle Tom's Cabin" .)
