Books with dislikable characters

[amillionnamechangeslater000]

Ok so weird request, but I have noticed that I tend to quite like books with unlikable and even pretty loathsome characters - think Gone Girl, The Casual Vacancy, and more recently The Recovery of Rose Gold.

So - can anyone recommend any books in this vein (yes I know it’s a bit weird)

When I was a child I couldn't stand Mrs Doasyouwouldbedoneby from the water babies. It seemed to me that she was priggish and interfering. I think we are supposed to like her. Maybe if I read the book again from the distance of 50 years, I might change my mind about her.

If you like unreliable narrator then Sometimes I lie is good

So many, but already noted:

Everyone in The Slap
Mrs Norris in Mansfield Park
Holden Caulfield
Frankie Adams in The Member of the Wedding
Petruchio in The Taming of the Shrew

Atomised -Houellebecq

This is why I like liane Moriartys books. Very few of her characters are wholly likeable which makes them more real to me

@GiveMeTheGlueGunOrTheRatGetsIt Who is it in The Picture of Dorian Grey that you don't like?

All of the characters in the Patricia Highsmiths books.

Cat on a hot tin roof characters by Tennessee Williams.

We Need To Talk About Kevin.

Couldn’t finish it - I disliked the woman so much.

@GETTINGLIKEMYMOTHER See I really enjoyed it but more because of my dislike (though actually I disliked Kevin - not the mother, but think that’s a whole different thread!)

I second Gone with The Wind,

I am listening to it on Audible having read it when I was a teenager.

When I was younger I thought Scarlett O'Hara was a feisty independent woman and something of a role model now I realise she is a complete bitch.

The Slap. Hated every single bastard one of them.

@ArbitraryNameChange on the recommendations of this thread am reading it now. Very very unlikeable so far.

I actually think Estella was abused emotionally and always felt sorry for her.

Sorry, just wanted to stick up for one character I love. Pip can be a bit loathsome if we're going for Great Expectations, though. I hate how he behaves towards Joe, while Estella's rejection of Miss Havisham is totally justified.

Dickens has a bad habit of inventing plots that brutally punish his imperfect female characters. In Great Expectations alone, Mrs Joe Gargery gets bludgeoned into a smiley vegetable for interfering in her husband’s work, chilly, man-hating Estella is given a husband who beats her to ‘reform’ her, and Miss Havisham is burned alive for having warped a child’s mind.

I would suggest:
The Last Weekend by Blake Morrison
The Death of Bunny Munro by Nick Cave
Mr Todd’s Reckoning by Iain Maitland
All full of unpleasant characters, all have an unreliable narrator, but I found them to be great reads.

My Lovely Wife is truly awful.

Yes to Blood Orange

The woman in the window
The man who didn't call
I let you go

Any character, normally called Kate or Liz, middle aged, middle class, lovely home, works in publishing or as an interior designer. Something goes tragically wrong with her kids or husband, involving a psychotic neighbour or someone from her past. She will rest her forehead against a glass window and drink red wine a lot until she solves the problem by killing someone in a remote windswept cottage.

This book is normally sold in supermarkets for £3.99 and I will buy it.

@dayswithaY spot on! I too will buy it.

I really enjoyed Blood Orange but I’m around Barristers a lot!

Anything by Jenny Eclair. I love the books but she populates them with some real horrors!

I agree ProfessorHasturLaVista I loved Moving but couldn't stand Edwina.

@ProfessorHasturLaVista as a teenager (older teenager) one of my favourite books was Camberwell Beauty by Jenny Eclair - read it more recently and wondered how on Earth I’d related to it so young!