Do we have to like our characters?

Can we care about our literary protagonists, even if we'd never want to invite them for coffee?

I’m currently reading a fantastic historical fiction novel for my book club—but I have a complicated relationship with the main character.

As I read, I keep asking myself: do I actually like this character? In real life, I’d probably cross the room if I saw her coming and avoid sitting next to her at dinner. She’s arrogant and dismissive in a way that would turn me off. She takes up space and does and says what she wants, sometimes regardless of feelings and consequences. The author clearly loves her, but I’m not sure she’s my cup of tea, even if I respect the hell out of her.

And I’m grappling with whether that’s actually a problem. As writers, we’re often told we need to make our characters likable. After spending years with my characters, I personally love them in the way I love long-time friends and family members: I see their flaws, but we have history, and I adore them scars and all.

Once I got feedback from a critique partner about Penn, the youngest sister character in my upcoming novel The Pearl Farmers. The reader suggested Penn might be too cold and unfeeling—maybe a borderline psychopath.

Harsh.

I see Penn more as laser-focused on pursuing her dreams, the same way her parents were, with some emotional damage thrown in that keeps her at arm’s length. I know this about her. It doesn’t resonate with some readers—but on the other hand, some readers really get it. Penn might be unlikable, but to know her is to care about her.

Interesting characters aren’t always likable

We want readers to root for our characters, but we need to avoid conflating likable and compelling. A character needs to be one of those things, but not necessarily both.

Author Claire Messud has been outspoken on this subject. When a Publisher’s Weekly interviewer asked if she’d want to be friends with the angry, bitter protagonist of Messud’s novel The Woman Upstairs, she shot back: “For heaven’s sake, what kind of question is that? Would you want to be friends with Humbert Humbert? Would you want to be friends with Mickey Sabbath? Saleem Sinai? Hamlet? Raskolnikov? Any of the characters in The Corrections?” She went on to say that “literature that’s worth something is not about being appealing; it’s about being true.”

The pressure to write likable characters — especially likable women — is real, and it runs deep. Messud has argued that “likable” is often just a polite way of saying agreeable, unthreatening, easy to digest. This is a cultural expectation.

As I internally shun the WWII agent character I’m currently reading, I remind myself of this. What would I prefer her to be—soft-spoken and polite? Palatable and easy to get along with? Am I not just playing into the “strong women are bitches” bias that continues to keep women from gaining power? She’s saving people’s lives, for God’s sake. Who cares if she’s annoying?

Last year, a writer shared the feedback she received from an award-winning author while on retreat: “I don’t want to hang out with either of these characters, but I can’t stop reading them.” The writer quoted it as a turning point — not just for how she saw those characters, but for how she understood her job. “The goal isn’t to create people readers want to be friends with,” she wrote. “It’s to create people readers can’t look away from.”

My beloved, flawed characters may be your bitter tea

I’ve been working on for a while now on a police detective character named Jules. She’s a hot mess. She makes questionable decisions, and she has blind spots she can’t see around. Most readers enjoy her, but occasionally someone suggests I should sand some of her rougher edges.

But now that I’ve gotten her exactly how I want her, I don’t want to change her. I love her not despite her messiness, but because of it. I know exactly who she is and why she is that way, and I find her completely fascinating. I would absolutely want to have coffee with her—actually, martinis—even knowing she would probably show up late, drink too much, and say awkward things.

I’m rooting for Jules in a way that feels almost protective. And that’s what will make her interesting to my readers: I’m invested in her, even obsessed with her. Sometimes I have to be mean to her, putting her through all the levels of hell for the sake of the story, but I know she’ll come out the other end stronger, wiser, or at least more deeply drawn because of it.

Still, I resist the urge to make her likable to everybody. Because I’m seeking truth, and the truth is that we all have different taste and tolerances, and one person’s Earl Grey is another’s rooibos. Readers might find Jules mouthy or stubborn or promiscuous in ways that are not to their liking—but all I care about is that they get her, and that that understanding makes them care about her enough to keep turning pages.