136: Writing Unlikeable Characters

 

The main character of your novel doesn't have to be likable! In this episode, we discuss unlikeable protagonists and how to create them. 

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writing unlikeable characters

Hello, welcome back to your big creative life podcast. I just recorded our June q&a podcast episode. And I was like, you know what, I think I've got two in me today. Normally, I try to batch my podcast episodes, but I was like, I don't know if I want to do another one today. But there's I have a list of podcast episode lists, like podcast ideas, and there's one I've been excited to talk about. And so I decided to do that one. I went out of order. Yeah, went a little rogue... this is okay. Let me back up.

 

This idea of this episode was inspired by a conversation that we were having in novel jumpstart about unlikable characters novel Jumpstart is this program that is almost done as I'm recording this, which is crazy. I feel like it's gone so fast. And it was a program for writers to help them write the first 50 pages of their books. And we have coaching call every Friday and there was just a discussion about unlikable characters, unlikable main characters in particular, and specifically unlikable female main characters, because that's a lot of what this discussion comes down to. And interestingly enough, when I hear people talk about this issue about unlikable characters in literature, I can't really think of an example of a time I've I've seen this discussion and it's a male character.

 

There are plenty of unlikable American male characters out there. But for some reason, it seems to be just worthy of discussion when it's a female character. I say for some reason, I mean, let's be honest, it's misogyny. It's women needing to be palatable and likeable in a way that men aren't. I mean, there's all kinds of reasons why this stuff from our culture in our society seeps into fiction. It just makes sense. But I do think it's interesting. Like, even when we were having that discussion, we didn't we didn't necessarily like talk specifically about women. It just happened that way. And I guess because the the writer who was who was who brought up the issue was, she has a female main character, but is so unlikable, protagonists, unlikable main characters.

 

This is something that I'm very happy has become more common in recent years in all types of genres. I feel like there was this trend for a while where main characters were close to perfect, maybe not exactly perfect, but close to perfect, where they were incredibly skilled and talented in whatever area was important for that story. They had amazing relationships. They cared so deeply about the people around them. They always made the right decision. Just I don't know, they were like beautiful but didn't know it. All this stuff, right that the characters were just like, 99.5%. Perfect. And here's the thing about that.

 

Perfect characters are boring. I said it perfect character characters are boring. No one wants to read about someone who always makes the right decision always says the right thing doesn't have to grow or change at all doesn't get into conflict with people. Like that's just not interesting to read about. And it's also not realistic. That's not real life. None of us is perfect. We don't always make the right decisions. We don't always have the best motives for why we do things like yeah, we're messy. We're complicated. And, and I want to see that reflected in fiction. I do feel like this trend of perfect characters.

 

I guess what comes to mind for me is fantasy that this was this was common in fantasy. And one of the when I started becoming aware of this, because this is not something I was always aware of. One of the first examples that I remember really sticking in my mind was the Hunger Games. Because Katniss this was a fantasy novel that was extremely popular how to female protagonist. Katniss was kind of prickly. She was not like a warm, loving person. I almost pictured her being a little bit like sullen. Sometimes, you know, she was not. She was not like what I was used to seeing in a lot of fantasy novels.

 

And that made me really take notice of that. And I'm not disparaging other fantasy novels. I mean, I, again, this is this is just one of the first examples that I can remember personally of a not perfect female protagonist in fantasy in a way that really stuck in my brain. And so after that this is something that I really started to pay attention to. Now, I do think there's, this is a spectrum when we talk about unlikable characters, because it's one thing to have a character who maybe is slightly unlikable, but like overall is a good person makes good decisions and like, whatever.

 

But it's another thing entirely when you have a character who is so dysfunctional, and so mean and cruel and unlikable to the point where like, the reader has not invested and doesn't care about them. So there is this delicate balance of having some redeeming qualities for your character, because you want the reader to still connect to them. Even if you are writing what you would consider a villain story where your protagonist is the villain like it's written from the villains POV, you still want to create a character who has some nuance where there are some shades of grey that maybe they think they're doing things for the right reason.

 

 And it just doesn't matter who gets taken down in the process or what the consequences the other consequences are. So that brings me to really what my first tip is, if you are if you are writing a character, and you want them to be slightly unlikable, you don't want to have this perfectly polished, incredibly well rounded character who just is like, an amazing, shining example of a human being. If you want to play with this data is one of the things to think about this balance this dance between the really don't like them, and also they're perfect to why do I want to read about them?

 

And think about redeeming qualities for this person. So as you're thinking about what makes them unlikable, like what their character weaknesses are, what their annoying traits are, what their flaws are. Also, in another column be thinking about what are their positive attributes? What are their redeeming qualities? I can't remember if I've talked about this on the podcast before, but I really wanted to have a somewhat unlikable character for my book that is about to go back out on submission, this thriller that I wrote.

 

And Jamie, the main character is, in a first draft that I wrote, she was like kind of a bitch, actually, she just was not a nice person. And she she evolved over the course of the book, but I had to dial that back a bit and show a slightly softer side of her because she was too aggressive and mean. And just like, I don't know, I feel like the reader just wasn't going to be able to connect with her. Because she just was, yeah, she was really mean to the people around her. So one of the things that I shifted in the early pages is I had her be one of those people who was always bringing gifts and treats for other people.

 

So she like for work. She was the pod wealth. I guess this was an earlier version of the podcast no longer exists. She used to have a podcast in an earlier draft of the book. So after I got through the first draft, and I realized I needed to make her a little bit more likeable. What I had her do is I had her bring in doughnuts for the team. So she was the podcast host. So I would have her bring in doughnuts for the producer and the social media person and just like her little team that worked on the podcast with her. And this is something that she did repeatedly, she would bring she would go to Starbucks run and like bring coffee for people.

 

 She would bring doughnuts and it wasn't like she was doing it because she wanted to manipulate people. It wasn't like it was a good action, but still with a malicious intent or something. It was just because she cared about the people that she worked with. She cared about the people in her life. And like this was one way that she could show it show her love that wasn't because she didn't she wasn't she's not an overly affectionate person. She's not like a sit down and tell my friends how much are they mean to me kind of person. So this was her way of doing that.

 

So that's just a small example of like, something that you can tweak and have the character do that shows a redeeming quality. And even if like I mentioned earlier even if you are writing a character that is more of a villain maybe they have a redemption arc through the book, maybe not even a villain needs to have at least one like redeeming quality and sometimes it's it's the same characteristic or trait just viewed in two different lights. So maybe your characters personality trait is that they are like extremely ambitious to the point where like they're willing to do whatever it takes to get power maintain mean power, whatever related to power, having that ambition and that drive can be a really good thing if it's used and directed in good ways. It can also be a bad thing if it's used and directed in bad ways. So that's an example of a trait that can be used for good or evil just depending how you how you direct it, I guess.

 

So yeah, that's that's a big tip for unlikable characters is to just think about the traits of that make them unlikable, but also the things that make them somewhat likable. Okay, my next tip is to say, think about shifting your mindset about how you think about unlikable characters, particularly if you are a woman writing a female character. This is specifically for you. Because of the internalized misogyny that so many of us have, where we want women to be palatable, we want women to be to not like ruffle too many feathers. I don't know, I just feel like most of us, not all I'm not gonna say all women have this because I don't think that's true. But a lot of us do have some subconscious shit like internalized misogyny that we just maybe aren't aware of, we haven't worked through whatever the case. And if you if you don't work through those things, or you're not aware of it, then that can seep into the the way that you write female characters in your books. So one of the things that we talked about on the call the novel jumpstart call is just shifting the fact that because okay, how do I say this? The person was worried that this character was a bit unlikable, and she didn't necessarily like plan for that. And she was a little worried about that.

So the shift is like, having an unlikable character is not a bad thing. Like I mentioned earlier, we want to read about complex people, we want to read about messy characters, especially in fiction, you have to dial up the conflict, you have to dial up the tension, the decision making the behavior, all of these things have to be amplified in fiction, in order to make a compelling story. So exaggerate all of these things. It's not a bad thing to have an unlikable character. Now, maybe it's just a matter of playing with that spectrum, that balance of how unlikable you want them to be. But just know that it's not inherently a bad thing to have an unlikable protagonist.

One of the things we talked about in the call was Nesta from A Court of Thorns and Roses. Nesta is they just kind of she's a bitch in the first book, basically, she's she's incredibly selfish, self centered, cruel. She's, she doesn't help Pharaoh, she's cruel and like, hates her father. And we can argue about, you know, her trauma and the fact that she chose to. She's processing and dealing with her grief and her trauma in a much different way than Elaine is in a much different way than their father is and Farah is etc. But why I loved a quarter of silver flames so much, which is NESDIS book is, I guess, I should say spoilers. I don't know I if you haven't read the books and you want to, I guess, maybe skip this next minute or so. But Nesta gets essentially gets a redemption story. In a court of silver flames. We get to understand her trauma, the way that she's processing things or not processing things, not dealing with them stuffing things down. At the beginning of the book, she's drinking she's like making bad decisions. She's just like, does not sound fun to be around, let's let's just say.

And then she starts to process she starts to heal. She starts to learn more healthy coping mechanisms. She developed self confidence, like all of these things to get her to the point where by the end of the book, even if you're not a Nesta fan, like at least you can admit that she's a bit more likable at the end than she was at the beginning of the series like at the beginning of A Court of Thorns and Roses. So nest is a great example of of that, and nest is redeeming quality is she is fiercely loyal. She loves. I mean, it would be nice if she took better care of Farah and had some of this directed towards her but she loves a lane so much like she would die for a lane. She would do anything to protect a lane. That kind of fierce love and loyalty is a wonderful attribute for her to have.

So even in at her bitchiest at her worst, she still has that side of her that provides some nuance to her character. So that's another tip I have, I guess just to bring another tip into this is look at examples, either in the genre that you write or outside of it, sometimes I think it can be helpful to, to look outside of our genre just to see, get some different examples of character portrayals and all of that. But yeah, do some analysis of like, okay, how is this author balancing these traits? What is the journey that this character is going on from page one until the end? Do they stay, you know, unlikable? Or is there a word? Is it a redemption story where they change and they grow, and they evolve, and they're a little bit more likeable at the end. But really, again, I when I talk about creating characters, and like how to do it, well, I use the word strong. It's how to create strong, engaging characters, because being relatable is not a requirement, being likable is not a requirement.

So that's, that's why I'm very careful about how I talk about characters because, I mean, if you want to create a very likeable character, there's nothing wrong with that. But even if that's what you want, just again, make sure that they have at least one weakness or flaw that you can identify because otherwise it it, you're just gonna have a perfect character. And that's no fun. Okay, I hope this is helpful. Big fan of unlikable characters if you couldn't tell from this episode. And I think it's it's I'm very thankful that the pendulum has started to swing not started has been swinging in the direction of messy, complicated, dynamic, somewhat unlikable protagonists. I think it's, I think it's a good trend, and I want it to continue. And that's, those are the characters that I like to write unlikable characters as well. So, hope this was helpful, and I will see you next week. Thank you so much for listening.

Katie Wolf