TOP TEN TUESDAY | UNLIKEABLE CHARACTERS I CAN’T HELP BUT LOVE

This week’s prompt is “unlikeable characters I can’t help but love.” At first I was at a loss. I could think of plenty of unlikeable characters. Tons. But ones I actually loved? Hmmmm. Then I thought of one. Then another. And soon, I did in fact have an entire list. So here it is!

             

Cara Romero from How Not to Drown in a Glass of Water is definitely not a likeable character, but the more time I spent with her, the more I felt I understood and cared about her. Lulu is… a difficult child. She definitely needs to hear the word “no” more, but there’s something about her spirit and determination I can’t help but adore. Ove is, as anyone who has read the book will know, a curmudgeon. But underneath the gruff exterior is a warm heart, and a thoroughly decent human. Aleisha, the teenaged librarian in The Reading List, is sullen, borderline rude and unhelpful to a widower who approaches her looking for book recommendations. I didn’t like her much at the beginning of the book, but as the story continued and she put in a significant amount of effort to right her wrongs, I came around to her.

             

I loved Hell of a Book. It’s one of my top books of the year. But the main character is a complete train wreck, and not always a stand up guy. The House in the Cerulean Sea has a few characters that are difficult, but by the end of the book I loved them all. Shuggie Bain is all about the relationship between a young boy and his alcoholic mother. She’s a completely terrible mother – neglectful, abusive, a terrible role model – but we see her through her son’s eyes and can’t help but feel mostly sad for her. She is broken, but not willfully a bad person. Razorblade Tears is about two fathers whose sons were murdered. They hadn’t been super supportive of their sons in life – they were gay and married to one another – but each come to regret their homophobia and try to make up in death for the love and support they didn’t give their sons in life.

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Both of the kids in The Secret Garden are deeply unlikeable – spoiled, willful, difficult and unpleasant. And yet we know (or learn) their backstories, and it’s impossible not to feel deeply affected by their circumstances. And, of course, as the book progresses they change drastically. There’s a reason this book is so beloved. Similarly there are several kids in Lonely Castle in the Mirror, and they’re not always that likeable. But again, we learn why they are how they are, what they’ve been through, and it’s hard not to care about them.

That’s all I can think of this week! What about you guys? Which was your top character for this week’s prompt? Did you choose any of my books?

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly link-up feature created by The Broke and the Bookish and hosted by Jana at That Artsy Reader Girl. Every week TTT has a different topic, and everyone who links up has to create a link of ten items that fit that topic. To see past and upcoming topics, go here.