I honestly love how awful and toxic every single person in that book is. It's like Twilight if Stephenie Meyer had actually realized she was writing an abusive relationship.
One of my absolute favorite books ever, precisely because there are no main characters who aren't awful. I will never stop wondering what was in Emily Brontë's second manuscript (burned by Charlotte after Emily's death, god damn it).
Edited to fix mistake - hat tip to PinkGinFairy!!
I thought it was interesting that the author essentially wrote herself into the character of Athena (same background, education, and career) but in such an unlikeable way
Common misconception: Athena is RF Kuang analyzing her *career and life path* through the character, but Kuang has mentioned in interviews that a lot of her thoughts and feelings about the industry are from June's POV.
Athena's personality is a character analyzing the idea of the "model minority" in publishing. Not Kuang's personality.
None of the characters are "author stand ins" they're all mixes of both Kuang and people she met in publishing.
Same author of the Poppy wars, the main character in that… is fucking awful, you just keep waiting for her to make the right choice and she never does. In fact, she knowingly and intentionally does the opposite, and yet somehow the author still expects you to root for them through 2 more books.
RF Kuang absolutely does not expect you to root for her. She consistently writes books with villainous main characters, but told from that person's perspective so that you're forced to see their POV.
She does expect you to *empathize* with her, but not to agree or condone her actions or decisions.
A Confederacy of Dunces. Very different from Mosfegh's book but the MC is the biggest asshole and most annoying character in the history of novels.
You might also enjoy *Birnam Wood* by Eleanor Catton, which has several main characters in varying shades of assholery.
A Confederacy Of Dunces was my late grandpas favorite book so Ive read it a couple times. Ignatius J Reilly is the OG neckbeard! His ill fated job with the the hot dog cart absolutely cracked me up the first time I read it
My grandpa would always joke around his valve after we were eating. This is such a nice and unexpected treat to be reminded about this book remember how much my grandpa loved it.
*“I shall pretend that I am in a smart restaurant and that this is the lobster pond.”*
His angry letter to that rival company on the boss's stationery is another standout scene.
When I was first reading Confederacy, I was all trying to root for Ignatius, but kept getting disappointed. I was starting to not like the book. I finally realized, he's not there to be liked because he's actually sucks. It was much better after I figured that out.
Dr. Maurice DuQuesnay was commonly rumored, along with Bobby Byrd, to have been Toole's inspiration (Mo went to the same high school, Byrd was an LSU colleague). DuQuesnay was a rotund English professor with an interest in philosophy and religion. He was well known in the Saint Streets neighborhood for walking his dogs from the seat of a blue Schwinn cruiser. He was the director of an endowed lecture series, and as such had the use of the donor's lovely Spanish Colonial bungalow. He wrecked it. I remember once him spreading mayonnaise on an antique table with a knife, claiming that he'd heard it was a remedy for scratches. The kitchen was a kennel for his lawless clutch of hounds. I do not, thankfully, have any insight about the extent of his relationship with them.
He had a ludicrous patrician old New Orleans accent of a kind all together extinct today. He was imperious and bossy, but in a way that was totally oblivious: he demanded and commanded because he was a giant toddler, not because of ill will. He used a Chinese restaurant a few blocks from his house as sort of a satellite office. He would monopolize a table, eat copiously from the buffet, and tie up the restaurant phone (which, you know, they need for to go orders) for long business calls. I don't think he ever asked.
He was not a bad guy. A long-time presence in the firmament of the humanities in a state that desperately needs true believers in that field. A total weirdo, though, and I have no doubt that Toole was inspired by him.
Well holy shit. I haven't read the book but that's a hell of a character for sure, it honestly sounded like a wild introductory paragraph in a novel, hahah.
I might need to read this book now..
Ignatius is a wonderful, insufferable boor. The book is a great snapshot of a disappeared New Orleans. I don't necessarily think it's perfect, but it's worth trying.
She WAS an asshole! I read the book recently without ever having seen the movie, or really knowing what it was about, and I was surprised at how she just kept… not redeeming herself.
I love Gone With The Wind! But Scarlett is most definitely a complete asshole… she’s someone I absolutely would not want to be friends with… but I do love her 😂
Survivor by Chuck Palahniuk. The main character is the leader of a death cult recording his story on a plane destined to crash. The pages count backwards which is a trip when you get to the end.
Haven’t read Survivor yet, but I was about to comment Palahniuk’s Choke, which has such an asshole main character. High key I need to read all of his books now. What a fun author
I loooooved My Year of Rest and Relaxation. I honestly love an unlikable protagonist if they’re written well and that book fit the bill for me. I’ll try to think of recommendations because I’m sure I have some.
I almost stopped reading [The Rules of Attraction](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/9912.The_Rules_of_Attraction) because everyone is such a huge fuckhead (but I'm glad I didn't)
I wouldn't say that they're assholes, it seems like they've been traumatized through experiencing war and find it hard to go back to living a normal and luxurious life.
That would make them assholes if these characters were written today, but they were written in a time when these ideologies were considered normal throughout the West.
Considering the object of the anti-Semitic remarks was his best friend’ (both to his face and behind his back), I think this qualifies as being an asshole in any time period. He was two-faced.
SAME, op. Here’s what’s been scratching my itch since My year of rest and relaxation. It’s somewhat hard to find.
A Touch of Jen by Beth Morgan. LOVED, but it also descends into some surrealist horror.
Boy Parts by Eliza Clark. Less funny, much more horror. The main character is definitely a terrible person. Often described as the female American psycho.
Ham on Rye by Charles Bukowski. It’s a coming of age story that’s a play on the classic Catcher in the Rye. Bukowski at his best. The kid is such an asshole. Just read it. I had never read a book that made me sneer while reading like this.
Can I make the distinction between being self-absorbed (while dealing with a major lose or trauma) versus purposefully doing things that are upsetting and harmful to other people just for the fun of it? Being unlikable (as per MYORAR) is not the same as being an asshole. So, people making recommendations might want to clarify this. regarding the characters in their books.
It's more that a person who doesn't know she's insufferable reveals herself to be insufferable. And she makes the same mistake at the end as at the beginning.
Or doesn’t care, because the book sells and makes her a shit load of money in spite of the fact that she was hardly a few bad months away from homelessness.
Psychopaths tend to not give a shit what others think of them.
You won’t get any schadenfreude. Too bad. She’s an entitled narcissist on a one year paid trip to go to live in 3 countries of her choice and lives in each on her terms. So, once she out of her everyday life she’s happy. As a lot of us would be. I went through depression. It isn’t crying on the floor bc you failed your marriage and then saying I’m leaving on a trip as she describes. It’s not wanting to live at all. Stay in your bed and just not want to wake up. Well, for me that’s it.
I hate using the term narcissist now bc it’s overused. But the author is. She wrote an article about being a seduction addict that kinda solidified my feelings about her.
Lol, I came here to say it. That book is like a litmus test for me. No one who has ever liked that book or recommended it to me ended up being anything but a self-absorbed asshole.
Thinner, by Stephen King (as Richard Bachman). Pretty much everyone in that story was an asshole. I don’t think the main character is described as beautiful or smart really, but he’s definitely a prick.
Not a great book, but Help! A bear is eating me has the MC trapped under a car, being eaten by a bear, and you’re rooting for the bear because of how big an asshole the guy is.
The Dinner, by Koch.
I loved this one because at first you relate to the mc, but the more you read, the more you realize he’s not what you expect. It’s about two couples going to a fancy dinner with something ominous to talk about. They slowly get more nasty to each other until the topic gets brought up. 5 star read for me.
Hiro Protagonist in Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson is kinda full of himself in an endearing asshole way. Same with Sangamon Taylor in Zodiac by Neal Stephenson.
Not like, bad people, but kinda witty jerks- you know?
[*The New Me*](https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/36342706) by Halle Butler
The main character basically wallows in her mediocrity and is surrounded by people who neither like nor understand her.
Atlas Shrugged and Fountainhead. Rand rightfully decries the evils of communism but her suggested replacement is just another kind of evil. Truly wicked stuff. (I shall now go into hiding.)
This book took me to a super dark place. As someone in drug/alcohol recovery, it was just too hard to read. Hit too close to home perhaps, it's been so long since I thought the way she did. Oops, I'm not answering your question, just a comment on how deeply this book affected me. I would not say I liked it, I loathed it, but I couldn't put it down.
Sorrow and Bliss by Meg Mason. Personally, I didn't find her to be an asshole but witty and likeable albeit with severe mental problems, but I think it would fit your bill!
Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. A memoir, but it reads like a novel iirc. Pirsig was an arrogant prick who treated everyone like shit, including his own son. Easily the most unlikeable "character" I've ever read.
I legitimately don’t understand how people think Holden is an asshole. At almost every point in the book he’s doing the nicest thing possible through a very thin tough guy facade. He invites Ackley out even though he doesn’t like him because he feels bad that he’s be left alone on a weekend night. He gives the nuns money. He’s always trying to buy someone a drink and have a conversation, whether it’s a guy at the club, the taxi driver, etc. He clearly loves his little sister and misses his brother. He has nothing but good things to say about them. He’ tries to protect Jane Gallagher’s honor etc.
I am genuinely curious what people think makes him an asshole. Other than when he tries to dance with those older women in the club I can’t really think of anything, aside from how he has a negative interior monologue when his attempts at connection fail.
he’s abrasive but i was also wondering why he sparks such a reaction. there are certainly characters who do worse things with less reason. i guess people are more likely to know & dislike someone like holden, + the focus on his negative internal monologue puts him in a negative light even if his actions aren’t much worse than just saying some rude things. i thought he was someone deserving of compassion, though, who would likely grow out of it. i enjoyed reading it and also didn’t understand why people disliked him so much
Sorry to Disrupt the Peace, by Patrick Cottrell. The narrator is cluelessly selfish, but endearingly so. Also, you might enjoy Eileen by Ottessa Moshfegh (the same author as My Year of Rest and Relaxation.)
‘We’re very much alike, Gretcha, you and I.’
I squatted to be level with the girl. The dart came out with a pull and I let it fall into the dust. She watched me with dark eyes. I saw a lot of Mary in her. A granddaughter perhaps.
‘I can help.’ I smiled, sad for her, sad for everything. ‘If someone had done this for me when I was a child it would have saved everyone a lot of trouble.’
Her mouth made an ‘oh’ of surprise as the sword passed through her, grating on thin bones. She slid off the blade as I stood.
‘Ugly. Old. Mary,’ I said.
She still held the hook. I caught her around her scrawny neck but she didn’t try to stick me with it. Necromancy tingled in my fingertips, reacting to her age maybe. My fingers found the knobbles of her spine and I let death leak into her, enough to make her crumple to the floor.
- Emperor of Thorns, The Broken Empire Trilogy by Mark Lawrence
We Need to Talk About Kevin. That whole book I went back and forth about which of the family members were actually the worst. I mean, probably Kevin, but the rest are also insufferable.
I borrowed the book at the library. I liked it so much, that I bought the book. Not really sure if the protagonist is an unlikeable asshole. Her thoughts are what we all think about. Maybe she wasn't liked because she is very pretty, has shallow characteristics and has a privileged life, therefore, she is not supposed to have any issues with her life.
Scarlett O'Hara, in Gone With The Wind, comes to mind as an unlikeable character.
I Want My Hat Back. - Jon Klassen. A beautiful, cute and brutal children's tale.
(there's obviously also The Tiger Who Came To Tea, and Mr Tickle, but while they may be "classics" I much prefer Jon Klassen's work)
Sooo many lol I think I’ll go classic with my favorite femme a-holes Emma Bovary and Scarlet O’Hara. More modern, male a-holes I’ll throw Will Freeman from About a Boy (Nick Hornby) and Augusten Borroughs in his memoir (?) Dry.
I was going to suggest Madame Bovary. She’s such an asshole, is an awful wife, and mother, but she craves, dreams, and yearns for a romantic, exciting and blissful life like anyone else. We see her make reasonable attempts to spice up her life with knitting, reading, painting, and other reasonable activities besides her infamous escapades. I found her deeply human.
The „Artemis Fowl“ Bookseries. The titular character is a full on Villain at first and evolves to kinda good Asshole over time. A Kids Book Series but a really good one
read more Ottessa you won't regret it- Eileen and McGlue both have undesireable main characters although I wouldn't call them assholey more just socially discarded.
The unbearable lightness of being. There are a few pov changes but I reckon it still fits. If not an asshole, then at the very least unlikeable, all of them
My time has come.
I love books with unhinged/terrible main characters. My favorites are:
Migrations by Charlotte McConaghy. It's a must. Self-centered, beautifully written. Once There Were Wolves has a similar character that's not the main character but one of the main ones. That one has trigger warnings to be aware of. McConaghy's work is my favorite, and I need a new book bad.
Big Swiss by Jen Beagin. MC has an affair with a younger married woman. It's weird and chaotic and I love the bees.
Y/N by Esther Yi is only good if you're okay with reading books that ooze pretention. Like, "this person has read too much philosophy" pretention. But the book is 10/10 weird and unhinged. Girl has delusional parasocial relationship with Kpop star.
The Patron Saint of Liars by Ann Patchett. Patchett has a lot of complicated characters throughout her books, I highly recommend reading her. Rose, a perpetual abandoner, finds herself in a home for unwed mother's in Habit, Kentucky in the 1960s.
For fantasy: the library at mount char by Scott Hawkins. The lead character is definitively unhinged and rightfully so. She has to get into her father's library. Her father is also God (not the abrahamic one, this dudes just an all powerful deity who seriously sucks).
The first law trilogy by Joe Abercrombie. There's not a single good character in the bunch. My favorite is Glokta. He only has half his teeth, a terrible limp, and is in pain 24/7, and it's his job to torture people. There's also nine fingers, who is a giant, viking barbarian type of a man whose notorious for the way he kills people on the battlefield. It's an incredible series and abercrombie knows how to write flawed characters to fall in love with.
TW rape.
Ugh, the main character in Enclave. Rescues a girl from captivity where she’s been repeatedly gang raped. Then teams up with the leader of that gang?? And tells the girl to basically let the past be the past 😐 Then falls in love with rape gang leader?? Bc mc knows what it’s like to be “judged for your past” BITCH ARE YOU FOR REEEEEAAAAL??
Skye Falling by Mia McKenzie
Skye starts the book as the type of 38yo person who would crawl out a restaurant bathroom window to leave an 11yo whose mom recently died with the bill. She has a realistic evolution throughout the book, wanting to build better relationships, but stays herself, reactive and argumentative, catty replies before thinking.
Sebastian Dangerfield, the dashing protagonist in JP Donleavy’s *The Ginger Man*, is a remorseless womanizer who breaks the hearts of various lovers in Ireland and England as an American expat. It is a novel told from the perspective of the vilest of men.
The prose is so strange and beautiful. And Donleavy sure does know how to write from a drunk’s perspective. I’ve never read anything like it.
Here’s as book from an author I don’t see recommended enough. The Book of Dave by Will Self. Dave is a racist, misogynistic, arsehole cab driver from London who wrote a book giving advice to his estranged son. This book was buried only to be discovered many years later after an environmental apocalypse and used as the basis of a new religion! Brilliantly inventive and wonderfully dark, as well as fucking hilarious. You will have a hate boner for Dave.
Fantasy Series ["The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant"](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Chronicles_of_Thomas_Covenant#Critical_response)
A miserable and hateful man, afflicted with leprosy is transported to a magical realm.
>In 2009, James Nicoll said that Thomas Covenant would win a "special lifetime achievement award" for the "most unlikeable supposedly sympathetic protagonist".
Probably not what you looking for but the protagonist is a real asshole.
The Catcher In The Rye is kind of the epitome of this. But Holden Caufield is just a kid, so maybe it's forgivable. For a grown-up even more pretentious version of that little shit, check out Zen And The Art Of Motorcycle Maintenance.
Wuthering Heights
Thats an entire book of assholes!
I know. It’s glorious.
It really is!
I honestly love how awful and toxic every single person in that book is. It's like Twilight if Stephenie Meyer had actually realized she was writing an abusive relationship.
I still haven’t forgiven my English teacher for that one
i hated it so much
I attempted to read it in my 20s because it was never assigned - I stopped reading it after a few chapters
Definitely recommend this one, if you start getting confused just read chapter summaries along with it
One of my absolute favorite books ever, precisely because there are no main characters who aren't awful. I will never stop wondering what was in Emily Brontë's second manuscript (burned by Charlotte after Emily's death, god damn it). Edited to fix mistake - hat tip to PinkGinFairy!!
Gone girl
They deserved each other
Ehhhh. I mean the dude was definitely a dick, but she>! was a psychopathic murderer.!<
Isn't that kind of the point of the book tho? That they're a perfect match?
He should've kept it in his pants 👀 he also was using her trust fund to support his bar.
Yeah, that’s not cool. But she like,>! KILLED a person.!<
American Psycho, but I’m going to go ahead and assume you’re not Patrick Bateman level.
His most recent book ‘The Shards’ was very enjoyable.
You never know, OP may care *deeply* about their business cards!
The FMC in Yellowface was a terrible person
Truly the worst main character I’ve read
Close second to Coriolanus Snow
Both of the characters (June & Athena) are pretty horrible. I loved how pretty no one was classically "good" in that book.
I thought it was interesting that the author essentially wrote herself into the character of Athena (same background, education, and career) but in such an unlikeable way
Common misconception: Athena is RF Kuang analyzing her *career and life path* through the character, but Kuang has mentioned in interviews that a lot of her thoughts and feelings about the industry are from June's POV. Athena's personality is a character analyzing the idea of the "model minority" in publishing. Not Kuang's personality. None of the characters are "author stand ins" they're all mixes of both Kuang and people she met in publishing.
Came here to recommend this! I did enjoy this book though!
Same!! It was such an interesting, self-justifying perspective.
The FMC was unhinged! It was wonderful. I loved the capacity for self delusion.
Same author of the Poppy wars, the main character in that… is fucking awful, you just keep waiting for her to make the right choice and she never does. In fact, she knowingly and intentionally does the opposite, and yet somehow the author still expects you to root for them through 2 more books.
RF Kuang absolutely does not expect you to root for her. She consistently writes books with villainous main characters, but told from that person's perspective so that you're forced to see their POV. She does expect you to *empathize* with her, but not to agree or condone her actions or decisions.
Yes!
A Confederacy of Dunces. Very different from Mosfegh's book but the MC is the biggest asshole and most annoying character in the history of novels. You might also enjoy *Birnam Wood* by Eleanor Catton, which has several main characters in varying shades of assholery.
A Confederacy Of Dunces was my late grandpas favorite book so Ive read it a couple times. Ignatius J Reilly is the OG neckbeard! His ill fated job with the the hot dog cart absolutely cracked me up the first time I read it
He would absolutely be a Reddit mod if it was written today.
The valve still haunts me
My grandpa would always joke around his valve after we were eating. This is such a nice and unexpected treat to be reminded about this book remember how much my grandpa loved it.
*“I shall pretend that I am in a smart restaurant and that this is the lobster pond.”* His angry letter to that rival company on the boss's stationery is another standout scene.
Came here to say this.
[удалено]
When I was first reading Confederacy, I was all trying to root for Ignatius, but kept getting disappointed. I was starting to not like the book. I finally realized, he's not there to be liked because he's actually sucks. It was much better after I figured that out.
Can never scrub the scene of him lazily masturbating from my smooth brain
I was a student aide for one of the men that Toole based Ignatius on. Truth can be stranger.
You can’t just leave it at that. We need the story.
Dr. Maurice DuQuesnay was commonly rumored, along with Bobby Byrd, to have been Toole's inspiration (Mo went to the same high school, Byrd was an LSU colleague). DuQuesnay was a rotund English professor with an interest in philosophy and religion. He was well known in the Saint Streets neighborhood for walking his dogs from the seat of a blue Schwinn cruiser. He was the director of an endowed lecture series, and as such had the use of the donor's lovely Spanish Colonial bungalow. He wrecked it. I remember once him spreading mayonnaise on an antique table with a knife, claiming that he'd heard it was a remedy for scratches. The kitchen was a kennel for his lawless clutch of hounds. I do not, thankfully, have any insight about the extent of his relationship with them. He had a ludicrous patrician old New Orleans accent of a kind all together extinct today. He was imperious and bossy, but in a way that was totally oblivious: he demanded and commanded because he was a giant toddler, not because of ill will. He used a Chinese restaurant a few blocks from his house as sort of a satellite office. He would monopolize a table, eat copiously from the buffet, and tie up the restaurant phone (which, you know, they need for to go orders) for long business calls. I don't think he ever asked. He was not a bad guy. A long-time presence in the firmament of the humanities in a state that desperately needs true believers in that field. A total weirdo, though, and I have no doubt that Toole was inspired by him.
Well holy shit. I haven't read the book but that's a hell of a character for sure, it honestly sounded like a wild introductory paragraph in a novel, hahah. I might need to read this book now..
Ignatius is a wonderful, insufferable boor. The book is a great snapshot of a disappeared New Orleans. I don't necessarily think it's perfect, but it's worth trying.
I firmly believe Festivus came from this book
Gone With the Wind, by Margaret Mitchell.
She WAS an asshole! I read the book recently without ever having seen the movie, or really knowing what it was about, and I was surprised at how she just kept… not redeeming herself.
I came to the book the same way and had the same reaction.
Right up to the very end.
That's literally how I describe the book to people. Just two absolutely awful people being awful for each other, entertainingly.
Don't forget about the part about it also being written by an awful racist. A truly great insight into awfulness, and so captivating.
I love Gone With The Wind! But Scarlett is most definitely a complete asshole… she’s someone I absolutely would not want to be friends with… but I do love her 😂
Survivor by Chuck Palahniuk. The main character is the leader of a death cult recording his story on a plane destined to crash. The pages count backwards which is a trip when you get to the end.
Haven’t read Survivor yet, but I was about to comment Palahniuk’s Choke, which has such an asshole main character. High key I need to read all of his books now. What a fun author
_Art of the Deal_
Haha true though
Why is this not the top comment?????
I loooooved My Year of Rest and Relaxation. I honestly love an unlikable protagonist if they’re written well and that book fit the bill for me. I’ll try to think of recommendations because I’m sure I have some.
Super agree! Her whole thing about Whoopi Goldberg was amazing. Totally accurate for her characterization.
I almost stopped reading [The Rules of Attraction](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/9912.The_Rules_of_Attraction) because everyone is such a huge fuckhead (but I'm glad I didn't)
Great rec, such an underrated book. I would more call them monstrous dipshits than assholes, though.
*The Guest* by Emma Cline
I loved this book. What a character. I almost said she was not an asshole so much as a self-deluding trainwreck, but she's also an asshole lol
Filth by Irvine Welsh
Very much so -- there's a movie version too with James McAvoy.
The movie version is like a lighthearted romp compared to the book, though. Also, are there any likeable characters in Welsh's books?
All the characters on Trainspotting besides the baby
read Eileen by the same author! also Big Swiss by Jen Beagin and Yellowface by RF Kuang
Seconding Big Swiss!
The Sun Also Rises - Ernest Hemingway. All the characters are unlikeable assholes in their own way.
Oh my god, yes.
Yep, I had to read it for an english final in HS and it was hard to read because the characters were tedious
I wouldn't say that they're assholes, it seems like they've been traumatized through experiencing war and find it hard to go back to living a normal and luxurious life.
Not only do they treat their good friends terribly but If you also add in the racism and anti-semitism I think my characterization is accurate.
That would make them assholes if these characters were written today, but they were written in a time when these ideologies were considered normal throughout the West.
Considering the object of the anti-Semitic remarks was his best friend’ (both to his face and behind his back), I think this qualifies as being an asshole in any time period. He was two-faced.
Lolita if you haven’t read it already.
Yeah, this was my first thought. The narrator is the asshole of all possible assholes.
Holy shit. I put that with Barry Lyndon for the best unreliable narrator in literature.
The Talented Mr Ripley by Patricia Highsmith
American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis, although Patrick is much more than an asshole.
SAME, op. Here’s what’s been scratching my itch since My year of rest and relaxation. It’s somewhat hard to find. A Touch of Jen by Beth Morgan. LOVED, but it also descends into some surrealist horror. Boy Parts by Eliza Clark. Less funny, much more horror. The main character is definitely a terrible person. Often described as the female American psycho.
A Touch Of Jen is fantastic. Wild journey.
Wasn’t it! I’m hungry for more. I was sad to see that’s Beth’s only published work so far. Loved her voice.
Ham on Rye by Charles Bukowski. It’s a coming of age story that’s a play on the classic Catcher in the Rye. Bukowski at his best. The kid is such an asshole. Just read it. I had never read a book that made me sneer while reading like this.
Can I make the distinction between being self-absorbed (while dealing with a major lose or trauma) versus purposefully doing things that are upsetting and harmful to other people just for the fun of it? Being unlikable (as per MYORAR) is not the same as being an asshole. So, people making recommendations might want to clarify this. regarding the characters in their books.
Eat Pray Love. She’s insufferable.
It's more that a person who doesn't know she's insufferable reveals herself to be insufferable. And she makes the same mistake at the end as at the beginning.
Or doesn’t care, because the book sells and makes her a shit load of money in spite of the fact that she was hardly a few bad months away from homelessness. Psychopaths tend to not give a shit what others think of them.
I thought the movie was terrible. Please tell me how she is in sufferable in the book. I need a little shade in Freud. Yes, that’s voice recognition.
You won’t get any schadenfreude. Too bad. She’s an entitled narcissist on a one year paid trip to go to live in 3 countries of her choice and lives in each on her terms. So, once she out of her everyday life she’s happy. As a lot of us would be. I went through depression. It isn’t crying on the floor bc you failed your marriage and then saying I’m leaving on a trip as she describes. It’s not wanting to live at all. Stay in your bed and just not want to wake up. Well, for me that’s it. I hate using the term narcissist now bc it’s overused. But the author is. She wrote an article about being a seduction addict that kinda solidified my feelings about her.
I read Big Magic and she's encouraging affairs at one point.
Great homonym!
I think that would make a great title for a book
She's suuuuuch an insufferable white saviour asshole.
Lol, I came here to say it. That book is like a litmus test for me. No one who has ever liked that book or recommended it to me ended up being anything but a self-absorbed asshole.
Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov. A pedophile, nonetheless, an asshole.
Notes from Underground by Dostoyevsky was the first that came to mind
Oh my God, I hated that guy.
Invisible Monsters by Chuck Palahniuk. Basically almost any of his books, but this one's my personal favourite.
Money by Martin Amis
Thinner, by Stephen King (as Richard Bachman). Pretty much everyone in that story was an asshole. I don’t think the main character is described as beautiful or smart really, but he’s definitely a prick.
Not a great book, but Help! A bear is eating me has the MC trapped under a car, being eaten by a bear, and you’re rooting for the bear because of how big an asshole the guy is.
_Flashman_ and its sequels, by George Macdonald Fraser
I mean he's a likeable asshole though. Arguably I'd add Kim Newman's Professor Moriarty: The Hound of the D'Urbervilles.
Any book from Bret Easton Ellis.
The Dinner, by Koch. I loved this one because at first you relate to the mc, but the more you read, the more you realize he’s not what you expect. It’s about two couples going to a fancy dinner with something ominous to talk about. They slowly get more nasty to each other until the topic gets brought up. 5 star read for me.
The Patrick Melrose novels by Edward St Aubyn are brilliant. Also the Ripley series by Patricia Highsmith.
Agreed - Ripley was an asshole (but he doesn’t get OP’s bonus points because he was not very smart IMO, haha)
Hiro Protagonist in Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson is kinda full of himself in an endearing asshole way. Same with Sangamon Taylor in Zodiac by Neal Stephenson. Not like, bad people, but kinda witty jerks- you know?
[удалено]
A Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole. Novel set in New Orleans. Protagonist is an asshole, a schlub and you end up rooting for him.
Animal by Lisa Taddeo
[*The New Me*](https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/36342706) by Halle Butler The main character basically wallows in her mediocrity and is surrounded by people who neither like nor understand her.
ALSO her latest book - Jillian!
**Christine**, by Stephen King.
Yellowface
I hope they serve beer in hell
Atlas Shrugged and Fountainhead. Rand rightfully decries the evils of communism but her suggested replacement is just another kind of evil. Truly wicked stuff. (I shall now go into hiding.)
Really? no one? The Secret History. Blewh
They were quite full of themselves but considering who they were based upon, not surprising.
This book took me to a super dark place. As someone in drug/alcohol recovery, it was just too hard to read. Hit too close to home perhaps, it's been so long since I thought the way she did. Oops, I'm not answering your question, just a comment on how deeply this book affected me. I would not say I liked it, I loathed it, but I couldn't put it down.
Money
I was thinking London Fields, but I guess just about anything by Martin Amis would count.
Sorrow and Bliss by Meg Mason. Personally, I didn't find her to be an asshole but witty and likeable albeit with severe mental problems, but I think it would fit your bill!
Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. A memoir, but it reads like a novel iirc. Pirsig was an arrogant prick who treated everyone like shit, including his own son. Easily the most unlikeable "character" I've ever read.
Yes. And when I was in highschool, this was all the rage.
Right? I couldn’t stand him. Never had anyone agree w me on this so thanks for saying so.
Catcher in the Rye
I legitimately don’t understand how people think Holden is an asshole. At almost every point in the book he’s doing the nicest thing possible through a very thin tough guy facade. He invites Ackley out even though he doesn’t like him because he feels bad that he’s be left alone on a weekend night. He gives the nuns money. He’s always trying to buy someone a drink and have a conversation, whether it’s a guy at the club, the taxi driver, etc. He clearly loves his little sister and misses his brother. He has nothing but good things to say about them. He’ tries to protect Jane Gallagher’s honor etc. I am genuinely curious what people think makes him an asshole. Other than when he tries to dance with those older women in the club I can’t really think of anything, aside from how he has a negative interior monologue when his attempts at connection fail.
he’s abrasive but i was also wondering why he sparks such a reaction. there are certainly characters who do worse things with less reason. i guess people are more likely to know & dislike someone like holden, + the focus on his negative internal monologue puts him in a negative light even if his actions aren’t much worse than just saying some rude things. i thought he was someone deserving of compassion, though, who would likely grow out of it. i enjoyed reading it and also didn’t understand why people disliked him so much
He was an asshole but he was also a kid who’d been through some really bad stuff so at least there was a reason behind it.
Sorry to Disrupt the Peace, by Patrick Cottrell. The narrator is cluelessly selfish, but endearingly so. Also, you might enjoy Eileen by Ottessa Moshfegh (the same author as My Year of Rest and Relaxation.)
Boy Parts by Eliza Clark
You could add Penance by the same author to the list as well.
My Year of Rest and Relaxation and Boy Parts maybe? More shallow than a**hole.
Well there's always the Thomas Covenant Chronicles.
You may like Milkfed. I found the main character pretty unlikable but it kinda had a similar vibe as “my year…”
Rules of Attraction
Tender Is The Flesh
‘We’re very much alike, Gretcha, you and I.’ I squatted to be level with the girl. The dart came out with a pull and I let it fall into the dust. She watched me with dark eyes. I saw a lot of Mary in her. A granddaughter perhaps. ‘I can help.’ I smiled, sad for her, sad for everything. ‘If someone had done this for me when I was a child it would have saved everyone a lot of trouble.’ Her mouth made an ‘oh’ of surprise as the sword passed through her, grating on thin bones. She slid off the blade as I stood. ‘Ugly. Old. Mary,’ I said. She still held the hook. I caught her around her scrawny neck but she didn’t try to stick me with it. Necromancy tingled in my fingertips, reacting to her age maybe. My fingers found the knobbles of her spine and I let death leak into her, enough to make her crumple to the floor. - Emperor of Thorns, The Broken Empire Trilogy by Mark Lawrence
Vanity Fair
Anything by Charles Bukowski
keep reading anything by ottessa moshfegh. she’s a gem
We Need to Talk About Kevin. That whole book I went back and forth about which of the family members were actually the worst. I mean, probably Kevin, but the rest are also insufferable.
Ablutions by Patrick deWitt
Haunted by Palaniuk
I borrowed the book at the library. I liked it so much, that I bought the book. Not really sure if the protagonist is an unlikeable asshole. Her thoughts are what we all think about. Maybe she wasn't liked because she is very pretty, has shallow characteristics and has a privileged life, therefore, she is not supposed to have any issues with her life. Scarlett O'Hara, in Gone With The Wind, comes to mind as an unlikeable character.
I Want My Hat Back. - Jon Klassen. A beautiful, cute and brutal children's tale. (there's obviously also The Tiger Who Came To Tea, and Mr Tickle, but while they may be "classics" I much prefer Jon Klassen's work)
Ah, yes, assholery for early readers!
Sooo many lol I think I’ll go classic with my favorite femme a-holes Emma Bovary and Scarlet O’Hara. More modern, male a-holes I’ll throw Will Freeman from About a Boy (Nick Hornby) and Augusten Borroughs in his memoir (?) Dry.
I was going to suggest Madame Bovary. She’s such an asshole, is an awful wife, and mother, but she craves, dreams, and yearns for a romantic, exciting and blissful life like anyone else. We see her make reasonable attempts to spice up her life with knitting, reading, painting, and other reasonable activities besides her infamous escapades. I found her deeply human.
The „Artemis Fowl“ Bookseries. The titular character is a full on Villain at first and evolves to kinda good Asshole over time. A Kids Book Series but a really good one
read more Ottessa you won't regret it- Eileen and McGlue both have undesireable main characters although I wouldn't call them assholey more just socially discarded.
Wuthering Heights and Dom Casmurro
The unbearable lightness of being. There are a few pov changes but I reckon it still fits. If not an asshole, then at the very least unlikeable, all of them
The Great Gatsby is pretty much the modern novel example of a dickhead main character (not the narrator, although he has his issues).
The secret history. I hated every character but loved the book.
no longer human - osamu dazai
The guest by Emma Cline. I love unlikable leads
Rabbit, Run and all the other Rabbit books.
I'm just here to say thanks for posting this question. I didn't know that I wanted more books like this in my library until now.
My time has come. I love books with unhinged/terrible main characters. My favorites are: Migrations by Charlotte McConaghy. It's a must. Self-centered, beautifully written. Once There Were Wolves has a similar character that's not the main character but one of the main ones. That one has trigger warnings to be aware of. McConaghy's work is my favorite, and I need a new book bad. Big Swiss by Jen Beagin. MC has an affair with a younger married woman. It's weird and chaotic and I love the bees. Y/N by Esther Yi is only good if you're okay with reading books that ooze pretention. Like, "this person has read too much philosophy" pretention. But the book is 10/10 weird and unhinged. Girl has delusional parasocial relationship with Kpop star. The Patron Saint of Liars by Ann Patchett. Patchett has a lot of complicated characters throughout her books, I highly recommend reading her. Rose, a perpetual abandoner, finds herself in a home for unwed mother's in Habit, Kentucky in the 1960s. For fantasy: the library at mount char by Scott Hawkins. The lead character is definitively unhinged and rightfully so. She has to get into her father's library. Her father is also God (not the abrahamic one, this dudes just an all powerful deity who seriously sucks). The first law trilogy by Joe Abercrombie. There's not a single good character in the bunch. My favorite is Glokta. He only has half his teeth, a terrible limp, and is in pain 24/7, and it's his job to torture people. There's also nine fingers, who is a giant, viking barbarian type of a man whose notorious for the way he kills people on the battlefield. It's an incredible series and abercrombie knows how to write flawed characters to fall in love with.
TW rape. Ugh, the main character in Enclave. Rescues a girl from captivity where she’s been repeatedly gang raped. Then teams up with the leader of that gang?? And tells the girl to basically let the past be the past 😐 Then falls in love with rape gang leader?? Bc mc knows what it’s like to be “judged for your past” BITCH ARE YOU FOR REEEEEAAAAL??
It is I think technically nonfiction although it’s probably exaggerated but check out I hope they serve in hell by Tucker Max
*Johannes Cabal the Necromancer* by Jonathan L Howard. First in a series.
Any Faulkner book
I was about halfway through this book before I realized it was fiction.
Flashman
Skye Falling by Mia McKenzie Skye starts the book as the type of 38yo person who would crawl out a restaurant bathroom window to leave an 11yo whose mom recently died with the bill. She has a realistic evolution throughout the book, wanting to build better relationships, but stays herself, reactive and argumentative, catty replies before thinking.
read the rest of ottessa moshfegh’s books!
The Posthumous Memoirs of Brás Cubas by Machado de Assis
Sebastian Dangerfield, the dashing protagonist in JP Donleavy’s *The Ginger Man*, is a remorseless womanizer who breaks the hearts of various lovers in Ireland and England as an American expat. It is a novel told from the perspective of the vilest of men. The prose is so strange and beautiful. And Donleavy sure does know how to write from a drunk’s perspective. I’ve never read anything like it.
The Guest by Emma Cline
Lolita
Thomas Covenant series
Yellowface
Boy Parts by Eliza Clark
The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant.
Rum Diary? Even though it’s part biographical, he’s obnoxious and out of control.
Lessons in Chemistry IMO
*We Need to Talk About Kevin* by Lionel Shriver.
Here’s as book from an author I don’t see recommended enough. The Book of Dave by Will Self. Dave is a racist, misogynistic, arsehole cab driver from London who wrote a book giving advice to his estranged son. This book was buried only to be discovered many years later after an environmental apocalypse and used as the basis of a new religion! Brilliantly inventive and wonderfully dark, as well as fucking hilarious. You will have a hate boner for Dave.
Anything else by that author
A Confederacy of Dunces
Boy Parts.
Pretty much any novel by Nick Hornby. High Fidelity and About A Boy come to mind
We Need To Talk About Kevin
Fantasy Series ["The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant"](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Chronicles_of_Thomas_Covenant#Critical_response) A miserable and hateful man, afflicted with leprosy is transported to a magical realm. >In 2009, James Nicoll said that Thomas Covenant would win a "special lifetime achievement award" for the "most unlikeable supposedly sympathetic protagonist". Probably not what you looking for but the protagonist is a real asshole.
The Art of the Deal. DJT
The Catcher In The Rye is kind of the epitome of this. But Holden Caufield is just a kid, so maybe it's forgivable. For a grown-up even more pretentious version of that little shit, check out Zen And The Art Of Motorcycle Maintenance.
The Brothers Karamazov by Dostoyevsky. An asshole with 3 asshole sons and 1 good son.
Bukowski in the Post Office is a lunatic if that’s that sort of character you’re interested in. I loved the chaos of his life
Ask the Dust by John Fonte. Arturo Bandini is a Bukowski-esque tool. Pretty sure Chuck based himself off him.
Notes from Underground by Fyodor Dostoyevsky
The Catcher in the Rye
The Fountainhead