Unlikeable Jilly Cooper characters

[Shellybang]

Over the last few months I've been rereading from Riders and just finished Mount earlier. Maybe my tolerance jas reduced (or I can't remember from previous readings) but so many people have given me the RAGE

Not characters that have been written to be purposefully unlikeable (Anthea/Valerie I'm looking at you) but main characters that I think we're meant to root for.

This isnt an exhaustive list by any means but top culprits are:
Abby - whiny and so so so selfish
Gala - the absolute worst
Etta - really really annoying
Janna - grimly inappropriate relationships with students
RCB - just a nasty vile bully (I always thought that but he gets worse with every read)

Who have I missed?

Chessie. I'm not sure if we're supposed to like her or not but she's so cold and manipulative. I'm not sure I really like Ricky much either. So many of her characters are unlikeable but that's the beauty of her books.

Definitely Chessie! And Lysander also gives me the ick and an urge to spray him with Dettol

Some really unlikeable ones have gone the opposite, Hermionie is my new favourite

The journalist who marries billy, shags Rupert and is generally a bitch to Helen.
Maud and Declan - just so unpleasant and terrible parents
Tabitha

Perdita = super selfish and constantly angry!
Red = cruel
Chessie = gold digger
Helen = worthy and earnest (boring)
Maud = forever competing with Taggie (her daughter!)
RCB = serial shagger
Rannaldini = cruel in every way (definitely suffers from inferiority complex)

I LOVE all the characters though and have always adored Jilly and her books.

Etta just drive me mad, such a sap!

I am struggling re-read Mount (or jump?) so I can go onto the final one.

Marcus is my fave or flora. But just have the young twin in this (from Pandora family and dating feral or Paris)

Won't re-read the school one though.

After the last book, RCB has lost his only redeeming feature so I've gone off him.

Taggie is ever so wet. As is Helen, in a different way.

Janey and Chessie are both horrendous.

I actually think a list of genuinely likeable characters would be a lot shorter. Lizzie Vereker, and possibly Marcus CB.

Hengist whats-his-face from Wicked mainly, he just come across as a creep who uses people to get what he wants, a bit like RCB but pretending to be nice!

Problem is in the later books the characters become so extreme - so old favourites like Taggie, end up being parodies of themselves. She goes from being really nice and sweet but with a backbone, to being a massive doormat.

Likewise the characters in Mount were just so unbelievable. Etta was an absolute drip, the daughter in laws were so vile as to be ridiculous. The narration from Dora was excessive and every single character had nicknames which felt clunky.

I think Pandora was the last novel which was ok. Wicked was good in its way but the underage sex was ick and Janna was a complete disaster who wouldn't have lasted 5 minutes as a teacher without being sacked let alone a head.

I like the character of RCB as it's a really interesting redemptive arc that he follows - ignoring the books after Wicked. He is really unlikeable at times but the books show the growth of him as a person and personality. Just like in real life, few people are wholly good or bad.

I always thought that Helen was quite badly done by. Her character in Riders was really interesting - she felt like a real person who was flawed but otherwise nice.

In the later books - and particularly in Score - she's so clearly characterised as a villain that I'm surprised Jilly didn't go the whole hog and have her appear in a puff of brimstone in every scene. Such a shame because if you think back to her origins, she married very young after being exploited by a senior professor, and had a miserable marriage to someone who was incapable of being faithful to her, and who was quite contemptuous of her hobbies. It would have been great to have seen her developed as a real character in her own right rather than as a foil for Rannaldini.

They are all awful!

Rupert is terrible. He should be in jail after what he Billy and Janey did coercing Helen in Kenya. Janey is ghastly too.

I don't like Declan from Rivals either. Taggy is so downtrodden I struggle to like her. Cameron is terrible, not food of Patrick.

And yet I know all the names because I did enjoy the books! Haven't read for years, but used to like them

I don’t mind Etta but I hate Martin and Carrie; they are such bullies. I also hate Red and Angel, most of the orchestra in Appassionata and Gala.

Ones I genuinely like are Flora, Patience Cartwright, Dora Belvedon and Sophie

@LBOCS2

After the last book, RCB has lost his only redeeming feature so I've gone off him.

Taggie is ever so wet. As is Helen, in a different way.

Janey and Chessie are both horrendous.

I actually think a list of genuinely likeable characters would be a lot shorter. Lizzie Vereker, and possibly Marcus CB.

I thought the same! Name likeable characters. Quite tricky.

For me it would be...

Caitlin O'Hara
Monica Baddingham
Maybe Lizzy Vereker and Tory Lovell...maybe Dino Fernanti too I think

On the dislike pile I'd add Jake and Fenella.

Oh and Luke! He always seemed like a good guy

Loved Luke and Marcus! Also quite liked
Lizzie Vereker and Lucy from Score. Hated most from Wicked and Mount. And always felt a bit sorry for Helen right from the very start

Helen can’t be forgiven for cleaning the piano keys.

I think I have read everything Jilly Cooper has written that is fiction, and an awful lot of her non-fiction work. She writes a good yarn, or so I thought as a teenager, but it gets very tiring that everyone fat is also stupid and worthless (or gets thin), and the idea that rape is a compliment makes me want to vomit.

@iamaLeafontheWind

Helen can’t be forgiven for cleaning the piano keys.

I was thinking about that just this morning.

Eldest DC is starting piano lessons in the new year.

Caitlin O'Hara
Dame Enid Spink
Freddie Jones
Lizzie Vereker and Jilly the "dependable boot" of a nanny
Mr and Mrs Bodkin
Tory Lovell
George Hungerford
Flora Seymour
Dora Belvedon
Gertrude the dog
Bogota the dog
Sailor the horse - to this day reading the Crittleden scene makes me cry.