Books with unlikeable characters

[Booklover23]

Ok so not very Christmassy but I am a fan of an unlikeable protagonist.

Any recommendations for my last book of the year?

Came to say this

She isn’t the main character but by God, Cleo in the Roy Grace novels is SO unlikeable. The author forgot to give her any depth whatsoever and so she is just this perfect girlfriend with no flaws at all and therefore no personality. I stopped reading the books as she irritated me so much.

Olive Kitteridge by Elizabeth Strout.

1984. By the end I was like yeah, give him the rats!

Yes! I almost stopped reading several times because I hated the narrator - so glad I didn't!

Other suggestions:
The Bee Sting
Wuthering Heights

Horrible characters but also such good books!

Notes on a Scandal - Zoe Heller

Queenie. She was awful.

Julius by Daphne du Maurier. Ooh he's a shit.

The Beast Within by Emile Zola. They're all awful. See a lot of other Zola for similar, like Therese Raquin, Nana, L'Assommoir.

The Beautiful and Damned by F Scott Fitzgerald. Two awful people get married. It's very darkly funny too.

Edit - didn't mean to quote!

So many mentions of books/authors I like here which makes me realise just how much I do like difficult characters!

But lots I haven’t read too - so building up a fabulous list!

If I had to pick, that's my favourite book ever... Becky's wonderfully dreadful, in a book full of deliciously dreadful people... and the two 'goodies' are such self-abnegating wets...

In the fantasy series by Joe Abercrombie - Sand Dan Glockta , he is a torturer, but despite everything I adored him pretty soon into the series.
Abercrombie rather specialised in awful characters.

You could also probably count the Codename Villanelle series (Killing Eve) but I wouldn’t call them remotely literary. Lots of people hate them but I enjoyed them. He gets Villanelle as a psychopath across pretty well.

Yes that was an interesting read

@Booklover23 - I would give The Debt to Pleasure by John Lanchester a go. Unreliable narrator but quite amusing,

Boyparts

The Great Gatsby

Oh thank you - I enjoyed Capital but haven’t read this one!

Wuthering Heights. Cathy and Heathcliff are pretty obnoxious.

Engleby by Sebastian Faulks

Gillespie and I by Jane Harris - excellent book but chilling, it stuck with me. The narrator is a piece of work and I will leave it at that.

My Dark Vanessa. It is very dark subject matter and you feel for her but she is very unlikeable.

I really struggle to see how Greg is “utterly unpleasant” ? other characters can be selfish Roderick or in cloud cuckoo land Mom but not unpleasant? all the years i’ve read/listened them to all 4 can’t think of anything? I’d sympathise with Rowley actually but I love that him and Greg are still a team

I don't know if it's been mentioned but notes on a scandal has a few very unlikeable lead characters.

Anyone read the Scotland street series, Irene is thoroughly unpleasant

Emma Bovary is also a pretty awful character. Actually the whole book is riddled with awful characters. Charles is a total weed, Homais is the archetypal bourgeois patrician and Rodolphe is a horrible lothario. Oh and Lheureux who drives her fall into covetousness towards her inevitable demise

and yet I love it !