Top 5 Wednesday time! This is a weekly book meme – the Goodreads group lives here – and this week’s topic is:
Most Unlikable Characters
— NOT VILLAINS! These are protagonists or side characters that are unlikable! (These should lean more towards characters who aren’t intentionally unlikeable. Not villains, or mean girl/guys, etc.)
I, like all bookworms, have encountered characters that I think the author intended for me to like, or even love, but I hated their very existence. Wished they could be obliterated from the book. Replaced by someone better. ANYTHING.
So, here’s the list of said undesirables:
- Bella Swan from the Twilight Saga. I wanted to love Twilight all those many moons ago when it was the thing – and whilst I thought it was okay at the time, I’ve never been able to like Bella. She’s too passive and boring and whiny. I ended up abandoning the series after three books. I just couldn’t face a fourth. *shudders*
- Mare Barrow from Red Queen. Mare was far too generic a heroine – I felt like I’d read about her before, several times over. Her blandness irritated me enough that I gave up after reading about two thirds of Red Queen, which was disappointing because the premise was brilliant and it had excellent reviews.
- Mal Oretsev from the Grisha Trilogy – NO SPOILERS PLEASE! I’ve only read the first two! i just find Mal quite annoying. I don’t why exactly. I just do.I feel like it’s probably more his relationship with Alina that irritates me than the character himself. Maybe he’ll get better in book 3? I remain hopeful.
- Alyssa and Jeb from the Splintered series. I loved book 1, I wanted to love book two, and book three got DNF’d, mainly because of these two. I found them whiny and annoying. You know what would have been better? A series solely about Morpheus. That I would finish! I feel like part of my issue with this series is that I started reading it when I wasn’t all that critical of what I read and the fact it was an Alice in Wonderland retelling gave it extra brownie points. By the time I got book 3 my attitude to reading was a lot different and the initial excitement for the series had worn off. Still, the actual world building and plot of this series is fantastic, as is Morpheus, so it’s not by any means a total miss.
- Quentin and Margo from Paper Towns. I didn’t manage to finish this one either. They were all so annoying! They ruined a perfectly good road trip. *shakes head.*
Well, I’ve spotted a pattern – if I hate the characters chances are I’ll not finish the book. I actually found it weird how many of these I hadn’t finished, because it’s something I rarely actually do. This list makes me look like a serial book dumper – I’m not! I promise!
Anyhoo, what do guys think? Agree with me? Disagree? Let me know!
thelibrarylizard.wordpress.com 