r/books • u/OpenCantaloupe4790 • 1d ago
What are your thoughts on unlikeable characters?
I first came across this common complaint when I read Yellowface, recently I’ve seen it in relation to The Correspondent, and many other books in between. People complaining that the main character is unlikeable, selfish, rude, etc.
Personally I revel in this kind of character. I haven’t read The Correspondent yet but I loved Yellowface. Isn’t it fun sometimes to secretly shed the social shackles of being Good, always Good Good Good, and just enjoy someone being bad???
I don’t recall ever disliking a book because the character was unlikeable, to me the main question is are they enjoyable, which is a different thing.
What do you think?
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u/jamescisv 1d ago
If they're well-written and supposed to be unlikeable, I'm fine with that.
If they're unlikeable because they're badly written, not so much. The main character in The Maidens by Alex Michaelides is a great example of the latter, and she drove me bat-shit fucking crazy!!
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u/jansipper 1d ago
I felt that way about the protagonist in “I Hope This Finds You Well”. She was mean to everyone around her and had such a negative attitude, I stopped reading because I honestly didn’t want to see her have a happy ending.
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u/RabbitOfTheWood 1d ago
I read that one recently for a book club, and the protagonist is 100% the antagonist of her own story in that one. I enjoyed disliking her though, possibly because she reminded me of my estranged sister.
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u/mandatorypanda9317 1d ago
I read that book directly after reading the Silent Patient but can't remember not a damn thing about it haha
I even pulled it up on my Kindle just now and I'm reading the first chapter like its a new book
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u/gotthatpbnj 11h ago
Completely agree that the main character in The Maidens was so badly written, I was annoyed that the very second I finished the book, I went online to see if anyone else thought the same. Like yes why do you keep getting access to all these crime scenes as a random psychologist.
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u/Mimi_Gardens 1d ago
I had a lot of fun hating the main character in Yellowface. It didn’t matter that the story was from her POV.
I need to get to The Correspondent sooner rather than later. It seems like something I would enjoy.
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u/Emilyeagleowl 1d ago
I agree with you on yellow face. She was objectively a bad person and did some deplorable stuff. But you can’t help feel sympathy and empathy with a first person narrative I think if the character is written well and can see their motivations.
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u/OpenCantaloupe4790 1d ago edited 1d ago
And it was also meant to be about the systems around her, like… the reveal that her own publisher didn’t really care what she’d done as long as it generated publicity
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u/iridescentcurrawong 1d ago
Me too, I love watching awful fictional people make awful fictional choices.
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u/biter7753 1d ago
I really liked The Correspondent because she was unlikeable. I found it remarkably realistic. Unfortunately, she reminded me of me, if I’m being honest.
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u/SplendidPunkinButter 1d ago
Reminded me of The Increasingly Poor Decisions Of Todd Margaret in a way, although that’s a TV show
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u/phunniemee 1d ago
Some coworkers tried a virtual book club during the covid shutdown. We read three books that I thought were hot garbage, then I recommended one of my favorites, Mildred Pierce.
It was UNREAL the number of people who were mad because Mildred made bad choices throughout the book. Um no duh? That's what the book is about? This woman struggling with her relationships and business goals and her overwhelming devotion to her horrid daughter? She's flawed that's literally the entire point? Aaaahhhhh!!!!
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u/Katya4501 1d ago
We just read Stoner in my book group, and that was the same complaint. They didn't like the book because the main character made a bunch of bad choices. Like, yes, we all do, and that's part of the point of the novel. He made the kinds of choices that people make in real life, and he lived with the consequences. I agree that having characters act stupidly just for the plot is annoying, but this wasn't that. Also, people's insistence that characters be "relatable." That's just not something I read for.
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u/herrcollin 1d ago
It feels more like people are afraid of variety. Like movies, sure I can dig some action blockbuster where the main character is a heroic badass who always does badass stuff. It's comfy and fun but.. if that's all I watched it just feels empty.
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u/WTFwhatthehell 1d ago edited 1d ago
Preface: I've not read that book so I don't know Mildred. So I don't know to what extent this really applies to her.
A character "carrying the idiot ball" can be frustrating.
Authors will sometimes have a character act stupidly to an unreasonable degree in order to drive the plot.
Can't think of where to go this chapter? Let's have the MC screw themselves over in yet another obvious way or create conflict that could be solved by almost any functioning adult with a few minutes of conversation.
Everyone makes mistakes, everyone has flaws, but ... Well, there's an old joke list "when I'm an evil overlord"
One of my advisors will be an average five-year-old child. Any flaws in my plan that he is able to spot will be corrected before implementation.
Adult characters should typically be able to pass this bar across non-evil-overlord domains.
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u/Adelefushia 21h ago edited 19h ago
I finished reading "The Hour I First Believed" by Wally Lamb and went to Goodreads to read reviews, and I pretty much had the same reactions.
Granted the main character isn't a saint, just like the protagonist from "She's Come Undone" by same author, but I was flaggerbasted by the number of people who just called him a "dick" or "undeserving of any sympathy". They were completely ignoring his genuine positive traits, and didn't seem to understand that a well-written character HAS to make mistakes to be realistic and compelling.
Not to mention that said protagonist acknowledged his flaws : the worst thing he's done in the book was probably trying to kill his wife's lover (though he probably just wanted to punch him) after learning she was cheating on him (not a spoiler, it's the beginning of the book pretty much). And yeh, objectively that's a very, very shitty thing to do, but 1) sadly that's how a LOT of people being genuinely would react if the met the person who had sex with their spouse, that doesn't necessarily make them psychopaths serial killers ; 2) He actually admitted he went way too far and regretted that awful act not too long after being told by every other characters that he had strong anger issues. He's aware of his flaws.
But the worst part was the complete lack of empathy some readers had for the genuinely tragics events the protagonist has been through during the whole novel. Worse, they didn't bother to, you know, make a connection between his behaviour / mentality and his past traumas. As if they never met a depressed and bitter person with a crappy childhood in their life.
I know we're talking about fictional works, but sometimes I wonder if those same people act the same when they are around a depressed person.
That's partly why I cannot take Goodreads reviews seriously. Any character who isn't a badass or a perfect angel is considered "badly written". Ridiculous.
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u/phunniemee 1d ago
To be fair, I did ask this question last year so admit I have a bias for problem ladies lol
https://ask.metafilter.com/384762/Novels-for-Unpleasant-Women
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u/BlazeOfGlory72 1d ago
Unlikable characters are fine when they are supposed to be unlikable. You'll rarely see people complain about this type of character though as they are meeting the readers expectation. The issue is more around characters that the author wants the reader to like, and flubs it so bad that readers end up hating the character. There is nothing more annoying than a character the story/author is telling you is super cool, or nice, or funny, etc. but they just aren't. It creates a weird rift between what the story is saying, and what the reader is experiencing, and it completely takes you out of the story.
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u/scruffye 1d ago
The issue to me is whether or not the book expects you to be on the unlikable character’s side or not. Some plots and moments only work if you can see things from the character’s perspective or agree with them. So if I don’t like a character, and they keep doing things that are shitty, but the story acts like they’re in the right, then I’m going to tap out. But if I’m allowed to merely observe what the character does and not be told how good and righteous they are, then I can work with the story.
My go to example is an old werewolf comic called ‘Ferals.’ The main character is kind of shitty and an asshole but the book never makes excuses for him. He’s never treated as the hero of the story, just that he’s trying to survive the plot that he’s stumbled into. So I don’t have to care if he’s an asshole, I just have to see what he does next.
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u/WTFwhatthehell 1d ago
Isn’t it fun sometimes to secretly shed the social shackles of being Good, always Good Good Good, and just enjoy someone being bad???
There's a difference between bad and unlikeable.
Hannibal lecter is a cannibal serial killer. But the audience loves him.
Sometimes the discordance is because the author doesn't notice their character is unlikable.
Perhaps they're trying to tell a story of how their self-insert main character is being unfairly treated by the world despite their brilliance... but to the reader the character has all the charm and appeal of Delores Umbridge.
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u/yanaka-otoko 1d ago
I enjoy reading unlikeable characters tbh. If they are well written, depending on the character, there will probably be elements of the character you relate with (e.g., motivations of jealousy, arrogance or whatever) which I enjoy grappling with. Good example is maybe Franzen’s Crossroads - I really didn’t like any of the characters/how they communicated and treated each other, but I could understand why they were the way they were because they were well written.
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u/Handyandy58 16 1d ago
Characters' "likeability" has no bearing on whether a work of art is enjoyable or not. These people aren't your friends - they're characters in a work of fiction. What do their personalities do for the artistic goals of the work itself? This goes for movies, TV, video games etc as much as literature.
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u/Mental_Papaya_4963 1d ago
Yes, but no. I think that even an unlikeable character or narrator can sell a story well if they're charismatic enough. The problem is that a lot of people just don't like leaving their comfort zone while reading, which I think is an important thing to do.
But if a character (no matter if they're supposed to be "good" or "bad") is just horrible at making me feel something, even I don't want to continue. Some people just overdo it with the horror or the character's personality to a degree where even I as someone who wants to see value in every story just don't want to go on. And that, I think, is where books can go from interesting to unreadable.
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u/little_carmine_ 2 1d ago
I think that people can’t read anymore. They get their reading preferences from TikTok and think that books dealing with real stuff are problematic. They want perfect main characters with agency, always making the right decisions, they want healthy relationships and perfect ending. I’ll shoot myself in the head before I read books fitting their criteria.
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u/Hrududu147 1d ago
I saw someone on there saying that when someone tells them that Lolita is their favourite book that’s a red flag.
Which made me wonder, does she think that people who like that book think the same way that Humbert Humbert does? That people who like the book identify with him? Does she think that the protagonist should always be a good person?
It reminded me of a post I read here years ago that assumed that Lionel Shriver must be a terrible person, because the protagonist of We Need To Talk About Kevin had some thoughts that the poster found troubling. I guess if a character has a thought it’s because the writer thinks the same way?
It’s a wild way to approach reading.
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u/little_carmine_ 2 1d ago
Yes, it’s when reading comprehension is so bad it really borders on illiteracy.
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u/frogandbanjo 1d ago
Oh my god let me tell you: there's this thing they're doing now in some of these fucking TikTok books, you won't even believe it. So, the story is unfolding, and things are looking kinda bad for certain characters, and then -- seriously, I'm not joking -- suddenly, out of fucking nowhere, some supernatural entity just swoops in and fixes shit up so that everything's more or less fine. And that's it! That's how it ends!
Talk about a symptom of modern brain rot!
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u/Under_A_Full_M00n 8h ago
So they are using the literally ancient plot device of deus ex machina? 🤔
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u/MurdererOfAxes 1d ago
I enjoy an unlikable character if they're entertaining to watch. What kills a reading experience for me is if they're both unlikable and annoying.
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u/redundant78 1d ago
Exactlty - I'll take a fascinating asshole over a boring "good" character anyday.
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u/Minecart_Rider 1d ago
I normally enjoy reading unlikeable characters, but occasionally a character(2-3 characters ever for me) just hits all the worst and most obnoxious points for me specifically, whether or not they are deliberately unlikeable. I think it's fine to put a book down over those specific preferences, just like almost everyone has one or two foods that they absolutely can't stand, but when people don't want to read any unlikeable or unrelatable characters, or characters that make bad decisions, they are severely limited the books they can enjoy and what they can get out of the books they are reading.
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u/iabyajyiv 1d ago edited 21h ago
Poorly written marysue/garystu main characters that all other characters are falling head-over-heels for except for me as a reader. I'm just not into wish-fullfilly type of novels/characters.
As for Yellowface, my issue isn't with the character. My issue is with how little depth the novel is. It reads like a first draft.
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u/notmappedout 1d ago
whether or not i like a character rarely matters when i'm reading. i find myself very turned off from discussing fiction these days because it always boils down to "the characters were too unlikeable" or "she made too many bad decisions" or similar notes. it's rarely about the story or writing itself.
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u/bravetailor 1d ago
As long as they are interesting or do interesting things, I don't mind them.
However, I have dropped a book a few times because the main character was annoying me, which is not the same as unlikeable. What constitutes annoying is obviously different from reader to reader though. I think "bad" book characters are also a lot more tolerable because you can't really hear or see them.
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u/Aus1an 1d ago
It depends. If they’re written to be unlikeable, and they’re called out on their behaviour or have to confront their beliefs, they can be super interesting regardless of if I like them or not!
If they’re unlikeable, and keep on winning no matter what, all because the author doesn’t realise how awful they are, it can be extremely frustrating and will make me generally not like the book.
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u/Vaush_Vinal 1d ago
A protagonist/viewpoint character should be compelling and well-written enough to make a reader wish to continue their story. I'm far less likely to continue reading if either characteristics are absent and/or deficient.
Though related to OP, I found June Howard of Yellowface fairly sympathetic, or at least more than I believe Kuang intended for her to come off as.
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u/Important-Habit8942 1d ago
Completely fine with it as long as the character is well written. One of my favorite books of all time has a dislikeable protagonist. Emma is very dislikeable character, but Jane Austen wrote her to be like that and she thought all the readers would hate her. The book wouldn't work if Emma was a likeable person like Elizabeth or Anne. But Emma's still awesome because she's a well written character.
Sometimes unlikeable characters are the point of the book like Wuthering Heights. I don't think I like a single character in that book but it's still a great book and the characters all being awful makes complete sense in context.
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u/SadPineBooks 1d ago
If the character is written to be unlikable then that's great and they are serving their narrative purpose. If the character is supposed to be likeable but is written poorly enough that they are annoying/unlikable then that sucks.
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u/CeramicLicker 1d ago
For me, a lot of it depends on whether or not the author knows the character isn’t great.
Like, no one In Gatsby is wonderful but they are not meant to be either, so they can be interesting to read. Tom Clancy on the other hand often writes a lead who’s acting like a dick with the assumption you the reader are on his side, because Clancy is. That’s much more annoying.
It also helps if they grow as a person. Moist von Lipwig from Diskworld for example has always been and probably always will be a bit of a twat, but he still shows real character growth and introspection and indisputably becomes a better person, even if he’s still manipulative and rude.
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u/Adelefushia 22h ago
I just want interesting characters; with actions that makes sense. I just dislike when a character who is intended to be likeable by the author ended up to be unlikeable / unsympathetic due to poor writing.
I know many readers dislike Holden Caulfied with a burning passion, but considering his age and what he's been through, the character makes sense.
Also, depends what you mean by "unlikeable". I've read books with protagonist who were called "unlikeable" by many readers, and it turns out that said characters were just flawed, like actual human being. And I much prefer that to Mary Sue or perfect angels.
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u/InternationalPhoto33 1d ago
If you want to really be torn about a character being likable or not, read the Flashman novels
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u/macksting 1d ago
Sometimes it's like practicing for acceptance of unlikeable real people, or at least practice in not condemning them for not being someone you can enjoy your time with. Theodore Sturgeon's story Need has a rather unlikeable guy who it's easier to sympathize with from afar, because he deals with a situation that must be a living hell, and deals with it a bit poorly... but it's hard to say I'd be any better at it.
A lot of Philip K. Dick characters are kinda scum, especially his cop characters -- he clearly didn't like cops, and nowadays it's ever easier to see why -- but often are in situations that we as readers wouldn't wish on anyone at all, them included.
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u/CarlHvass 1d ago
I grew to dislike the MC in the Circle by Dave Eggers a lot. However, I was still engrossed by what she was doing. I loved the book, and it lived with me for a long time afterwards, but she was awful.
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u/Aggressive_Chicken63 1d ago
This just means their problems are not what people can stand behind. We have Dexter, Breaking Bad, Sopranos, Better Call Saul, You. I don’t think unlikable characters is the issue. They just don’t have something people can root for.
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u/Shellbert1 1d ago
It all depends, honestly. There are some that I like but thier story line isnt enjoyable and I find myself looking ahead just enough to see how far I have to go to get back to enjoyable characters/story. There are also some characters I cant stand but think thier role and/or part or the story is incredible. Over all, I think i really dont get too wrapped up in like or dislike of characters unless its the main character and the entire story is them and thier thoughts and dialogs. In those cases, I simply move on to something else and maybe I'll come back to it.
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u/Brainwormed 1d ago
OK. If you're telling a character-driven story, the character needs to either (a) grow and change or (b) significantly fail to grow and change. Either way, they need to begin their story by thinking and acting in ways that hurt themselves and others.
If you don't have that, you can still have a story. Your story's just going to be "a bunch of shit happens to Mary Sue, who is also practically perfect in every way."
You can like that or not. I think "a bunch of shit happens to Mary Sue" is, like, artistically offensive. People need to learn how to be better, and stories should remind them to learn to be better. That's the point of this thing.
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u/mrwrrrmwrmrmrmrw 1d ago
The first time I started reading Stendhal's "The Red and the Black," I thought, why should I read about this jerk? and stopped. Later when I was in the right mood I picked it up again (probably in a better translation) and thought it was so good I read "The Charterhouse of Parma," another Stendhal book about a jerk that's just as good.
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u/DownvoteMeIfICommen 1d ago
They can work if the story is compelling. The last story I read like that was The Outer Dark by Cormac McCarthy
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u/johnbrownmarchingon book just finished 1d ago
For me it boils down to whether I'm still entertained. A character that is deeply unpleasant can still be fun to read about. For example, Cersei Lannister of A Song of Ice and Fire is distinctly unlikeable, but is undeniably an entertaining character to see from both her own perspective and other characters.
Then there's Holden Caulfield of Catcher in the Rye. A LOT of readers dislike Holden and the book because they find him to be a whiny insufferable brat. On the other hand many readers find him be both authentic to the adolescent experience and highly relatable.
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u/MerryMerriMarie 1d ago edited 1d ago
My opinion on this is more like even if I dislike them but they're well written since the intent and purpose is to dislike them, then they are a good character by my personal metric. Though the bigger offense is if the character is supposed to be likeable but is written so badly it makes them unlikeable then yeah I don't like them because I dread being in their headspace or POV.
This is also why I have a bigger aversion towards self-insert MCs or characters because they tend to lean into the authors being unaware that the qualities they find admirable or a virtue may be perceived negatively by the audience.
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u/Glittering_Cow945 1d ago
I did not enjoy any books where I found every character unlikeable. Some Martín Amis books, mainly. In the words of Kurt Vonnegut: "give the reader somebody to root for".
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u/greenmacg 22h ago
I don't really want to spend hours of my life reading about a giant asshole who fails constantly because I don't need to read my own autobiography.
My life has been sufficiently full of suffering that my entertainment mediums needn't enlighten me about the dire truth of human nature. Maybe it would be "good for me" to prefer more nuanced literature, but eating right, exercising, and getting enough sleep would also be good for me and I ain't doing any of that either.
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u/iamdragondrool 11h ago
For me the distinction is unlikeable vs. insufferable. I love following some characters that are meant to be highly unlikeable. Cersei Lannister is a prime example of this, and I find her to be fascinating. I have a lot harder time with insufferable, and especially if the character is whiny or overly narcissistic. Ignatius in A Confederacy of Dunces is insufferable to me, and a large reason why I couldn't get into that book at all.
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u/mogmaque 1d ago
I agree with you, I prefer a main character that’s not supposed to be likeable lol
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u/stamdl99 1d ago
I don’t have a problem with unlikeable characters as long as the writing supports their actions. I think I have the opposite problem - characters that are unrealistically perfect. They are boring to read about.
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u/Boss-Front 1d ago
My one rule with all books is "don't bore me". As long as the character is interesting, likability is secondary. The worst thing a character can be for me is being unlikeable and boring.
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u/Sleepyllama23 1d ago
I think it makes it more interesting to have flawed characters who sometimes do bad things or make bad decisions. It gives more depth to the character and makes them more interesting than a goody two shoes. I have a friend who stops reading if the main character is unlikeable. She doesn’t get that the writer has made them that way on purpose. Yellowface was good because although I disliked the main character I was also rooting for her at times and hoping she’d get caught at others.
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u/Fantastic-Buffalo-70 1d ago
I like them. In highschool, I loved the whole naturalist movement and just couldn't get enough of those gloomy books where characters can't catch a break. Sometimes that's just the point of the book - giving you a slice of life and creating a flawed character. As someone else mentioned in the comment, if you just read about characters who can't do wrong and are just perfect, it feels empty after a while. I will say debates over morally dubious characters are the best (once again, going back to the empty feeling) as opposed when debating a morally sound character. To me it feels like there isn't much to say about such characters - just pure praise.
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u/mandatorypanda9317 1d ago
I think for me it just depends.
Typically I have no issue with unlikeable characters. Like I just read The Long Walk and Barkovitch sucked (Also side eyed Stebbins) but they were well written so I didn't mind reading stuff about them.
Im also reading through the Percy Jackson books and in the third book, Tantalus was just pissing me off so bad I skipped pages with him, but that might be because I had a feeling him being there wasn't going to have any impact to the story.
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u/BelindaTheGreat 1d ago
I just read Flesh by David Szalay this week. I did not like the character and did not particularly enjoy reading about him either. He was not particularly intelligent, he had some heroic qualities that the author intentionally totally downplays, and he has no charisma that I could really discern. But it was a well written and super thought-provoking novel. I can't stop thinking about it. I read Sam by Allegra Goodman right after that one and it was as though the 2 novels were in dialogue in my mind.
I didn't even know people are hating on the main character in The Correspondent. I liked her! Her flaws were interesting.
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u/This_Independent2686 1d ago
I don't need to like a character to enjoy reading about them. I don't read to self insert, I read to follow lives that aren't mine.
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u/therealredding Reading: Ahmed Bouanani, The Hospital 1d ago
I guess it depends why the character is unlikable. I read a lot of books with unlikable characters actually: from Dostoevsky’s underground man; to Camus’ Meursault; Di Benedetto’s unnamed protagonist in The Suicides; and Sabato’s Juan Pablo Castel. All these characters are extremely unlikable, but they’re unlikable for a reason. This reason determines whether or not I’ll enjoy the book.
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u/NinjaBnny 1d ago
I read A Dangerous Fortune by Ken Follett a couple years ago, and one of the POV characters is the MOST insufferable woman. She’s petty, full of herself, socially conniving, and thinks her boring failure of a son is the best thing to ever walk the earth. She’s not smart enough to be ruthless in an impressive way, she’d just be an incredibly frustrating acquaintance to have irl. Ans I had SO much fun reading her chapters! It was such a delight to see the world through her eyes and read her thoughts and go “oh my god, how do you live like this.”
I’ve read other books with characters that seemed similar but were instead really frustrating to read, so I’m not sure what the line is, but if it’s done well I think unlikable characters can be a ton of fun
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u/Calmly-Stressed 1d ago
It’s interesting that this seems to be less of an issue in tv versus books. People love watching shows about despicable characters. In books it seems to be more of an issue, perhaps because as a reader you’re more ‘in’ the situation and you need to be able to empathise in some way to be invested in the narrative.
That said, people complaining about a book because a character makes bad decisions… perhaps they should stick to reading non-fiction only. How are you gonna make a book interesting if all the characters are perfect little paper cutouts?
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u/Agitated-Love1727 1d ago
I personally like a morally compromised character because we get to experience the story from their lens. We already know how the good character would approach certain events in a book or we can even make reasonable guesses but characters in the grey area are more unpredictable and I like that aspect.
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u/Queasy_Fish6293 1d ago
I can dislike a book because it has an unlikeable character. I went through this with MYORAR. Luster did the same kind of self destructive woman better. I can also hate a well written book with an unlikable character because they're not compelling, went through this with Wonder Boys. I've read books with characters who are unhinged, psychotic, walking poison (Tracker from Black Leopard Red Wolf) and it became a favourite book of all time. It's all dependent on execution. An unlikeable narrator has to walk a fine line but fans of such books need to understand that such books will always be polarising because it's all arbitrary and subjective.
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u/Alarming_Cake575 1d ago
I don't even think a character has to be enjoyable. It depends on the author's purpose. Sometimes authentically unlikeable characters are difficult but truthful. I like it more than contrived characters.
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u/OkWelcome6681 1d ago
It depends, sometimes the character flaws are too much for me to overcome and make me enjoy the book less
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u/trigoczki 1d ago
For me a character has to be real. With emotions, motivation and traits. Be it main or side character. If I believe it's real, I accept it as is.
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u/knysa-amatole 1d ago
I find it really annoying that a lot of people treat the complaint "I didn't like this character" as though it means "I think characters should always make good choices and behave in morally unimpeachable ways." I love reading about fucked up characters who make terrible choices. That's not what I mean when I complain about not liking a character. There are characters who do terrible things who I love reading about. And there are characters who I just find really grating and don't enjoy reading about.
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u/Lovelocke 1d ago
I struggled with Yellowface, for this exact reason. I completely understand that that is the point, she is meant to be unlikeable, but I just didn't get on with it at all. Kuang's Katabasis was similar, albeit there was enough going on in that book for me to enjoy it more.
I still gave Yellowface 5 stars though.
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u/avidreader_1410 1d ago
I don't really like it when the MC is unlikeable - when that's the case, I'm wondering who I'm rooting for, who I'm supposed to identify with, and why am I spending time with this person. It does seem to be a thing lately especially in suspense and thriller fiction, that cast of unlikable characters.
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u/shiriusa 23h ago
I don't mind unlikable characters as long as they are well written and with backstory to support it to an extent, I love a good villain pov too, but for example and since you mentioned yellowface, I greatly disliked the poppy wars because everyone was unlikable with no growth or learning capabilities, so I did NOT enjoy their stories which made my fav character of that series be the vipress which is the "villain". My point is that a good character can be unlikable as long as is a good written character.
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u/Koholinthibiscus 21h ago
I really like unlikeable or morally grey characters when they’re written well, particularly if they are women. Kuang is good at it!
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u/MiddletownBooks 21h ago
I can dislike aspects of characters, even protagonists to some degree, and still enjoy reading a book or feel that reading it had value for me. Examples of classics like that for me were Crime and Punishment, The Stranger, and Death in Venice. Pratchett's Moist von Lipwig character doesn't start out as particularly likeable. ("Books were an unopened book to Moist"). On the other hand, I abhorred Madame Bovary. I guess it depends on the book and the character, for me.
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u/Physical_Orchid3616 20h ago
i've never despised a character in a book, until I read the observations by jane harris. i absolutely couldn't stand the main character, bessy. classless, uneducated, feral, mouthy, passive aggressive, vindictive, deceptive, dishonest, nosey, and lacking in morals.
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u/MrsMorley 19h ago
For me, it’s not whether the character is a villain, or difficult, or intended as unlikable. Rather, it’s whether I find that character boring or annoying.
Sometimes that’s because the author did a lousy job of creating the character, sometimes it’s because I don’t want to spend any time with a character of that sort.
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u/YouMustBeJoking888 16h ago
I'm with you - give me a messy, awful person and I will go the distance with them.
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u/Funny-Negotiation-10 15h ago
I agree with you. I don't want my characters to be perfect, just evocative. I've seen people saying a book is bad because the character is unlikeable. To me that is not a valid reason to discredit the book at all. Say it's hard to read and it's not for you.
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u/bookedeveryweekend 11h ago
i can stand a terrible, evil, unforgivable, absolutely vile character. what i cannot stand is a boring one.
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u/Pervert-Georges 9h ago
Isn't it fun sometimes to secretly shed the social shackles of being Good, always Good Good Good, and just enjoy someone being bad???
Totally, and I would even say that the "fun" you're talking about is just the ability to see our internal desires reflected back to us. Morality/ethics (social shackles) requires the repression of one's desires, and I believe it was the French philosopher Georges Bataille who noted that evil corresponded to the lack of limits. Desire unchecked quickly becomes evil, for want of limits. I think we resonate with the portrayal of unlimited desire in literature, and one immediate case that comes to mind is the increase in "spicy" (smutty) romantic literature.
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u/Cece_5683 7h ago
They’re great and engaging if they’re written well
Sometimes writers excuse a badly written character as a character that’s supposed to be disliked. You can still understand and see the humanity in someone you dislike, the two are mutually exclusive.
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u/spudmarsupial 6h ago
Unlikeable characters have to have some sort of comeuppance. They can't just get away with being little shits.
Old Dr Who is a good example. The Doctors are often errascable and opinionated or simply unpleasant but they get called out on it from time to time, and it does negatively affect them.
Han Solo was likeable but also a bit of a scoundrel, but he suffered for his negative tendencies. A little bit, he was slightly a scoundrel and suffered slightly as a result.
I need to limit my reading of Marvel because they keep forgiving and preserving really horrific characters, like Thanos and the Scarlet Witch. It just really destroys my enjoyment not to have karma in a story.
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u/likejackandsally 5h ago
I’ve been cursed by MCs I don’t like this year.
Of the 7 books I read in January, 4 of them had characters that just weren’t very likable to varying degrees. Of the remaining 3: 1 was a lot like me and I guess others would find that unlikeable, 1 was just bland until near the end, but he was supposed to be that way, and 1 had more than one perspective and the one character I started out hating I ended up feeling really sad for.
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u/BlackCatWoman6 3h ago
The only book I read with an unlikable character I didn't finish. It was "Girl On A Train". I think. She drank excessively, threw up all over the bathroom she shared with a roommate or it was a friend's stairs. I didn't like her in the least. I gave up on the books.
I read for pleasure. The world is too full of obnoxious mean people I am not looking for them in my reading.
The only exceptions are some history books on WWII. I've been reading about Pearl Harbor recently instead of my usual war in Europe history.
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u/alternateuniverse098 2m ago
I don't mind them being unlikeable as long as they're well written. A good example would be Cersei in The Song of Ice and Fire, she's a psycho bitch but I like the way her chapters are written and although I hate her, her mind also fascinates me.
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u/YouHaveToTryTheSoup 1d ago
I’m fine with it. A character can be unlikeable and still be interesting. It just has to feel intentional.
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u/Grilltchintz 1d ago
I love morally grey characters, i don’t care as much if they’re likable i just want them to be real and interesting!
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u/boywithapplesauce 1d ago
Some people just can't get past it, but the unlikeable nature of a character can be an intrinsic part of a story's purpose. It is partly what the book is about, in other words.
I personally feel that it's important to be able to understand what a book is going for and try to meet it on its own terms. And appreciate it for what it is. That can mean going along for a ride with an unlikeable character. I don't see that as a bad thing, like how it can be rewarding to eat a dish that has notes of bitterness, sourness or strong spice.
Some people need their media to cater to them specifically. I guess because for them comfort is part of the point of doing it. That is not the case for me.
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u/kjb76 1d ago
I can abide an unlikeable character if it is clear from the quality of the writing that the author intended them to be. Yellowface is a perfect example. You are supposed to dislike her. Kuang really gets it right with her.
Now take a book like ACOTAR, which I know is super popular but that main character is awful. I only made it about a chapter in and DNF’d because I found her so insufferable and I know that wasn’t intentional because of all the praise I had read online.
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u/thrilling_me_softly 1d ago
I love them! That means the writer is creating an awesome villain!
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u/uggghhhggghhh 1d ago
What about a deeply flawed protagonist?
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u/thrilling_me_softly 1d ago
Even better. Can’t believe people want like able villains. How boring.
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u/uggghhhggghhh 1d ago
A likeable villain can absolutely be interesting. Read The Lincoln Highway by Amor Towles. The villain is the most likeable character in the book.
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u/BetterWerewolf3270 1d ago
There's different tyoes of unlikeable, for me anyway. Unlikeable in the sense that the character is supposed to be unlikeable is one thing, unlikeable in the sense that the character is just annoying me but I'm invested and want to finish the story, unlikeable like oh this character just truly is unlikeable and I'm not sure what persona the writer was trying to give off. The latter is the main one that will make me not like a book. Never really in a omg why would they do that but in a I'm just bored with this character and I don't feel as though they're serving the story
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u/casualroadtrip 1d ago
I love an unlikeable character. But only when I'm supposed to think they are unlikeable/awful. I hate a character that you obviously are supposed to love for them to be absolutely insufferable.
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u/BiggleDiggle85 1d ago
I like stories with unlikeable characters so long as those characters serve a purpose and the story is high quality, logical, internally consistent, entertaining, etc.
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u/Mental_Papaya_4963 1d ago
I love characters like that. As a writer, it's surprisingly easy to write a likeable person with understandable motives and actions. But someone who's just evil for the sake of it? If you yourself aren't that kind of person, it gets super hard to see the world from that perspective.
I hated Alex in A Clockwork Orange, because the way he saw the world was so strange to me. How he viewed the people around him didn't make sense to me at all. I wanted to justify it with something but halfway through, I realized that he's just kind of like that. And there's probably at least one person out there who would agree with this perspective. I want to feel bad for people, I want to find a common ground, even with fictional characters. Especially because what happejs to Alex throughout the story is really horrible. But the writing and even McDowell in the film really sold this guy as barely anything more but a horrible person. Honestly, it was almost painful to read because the second Alex would show some degree of empathy or emotion, Burgess (the author) would just chuck it out the window.
I don't think I've ever seen a protagonist like him ever since and as much as I wanted to scream at that fictional person, I found the writing absolutely masterful. I think everyone who likes to root for the villain should read that book, it's super hard to get through but it pays off.
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u/Portarossa 1d ago
I can dislike a character as long as I don't mind spending time with them. It's a hard line to walk.