the craft. the challenge of unlikable characters.

As I’ve been mulling over what I’m ready to work on next, I stumbled upon what feels like a next challenge for me. Writing an unlikeable female protagonist. I was struck by an interview I saw circulating with our literary godmother Toni Morrison, where the interviewer asks her about her female characters. He references them as rebels and trouble makers and Morrison, who is always profound, essentially says that these women make for great stories and while she wants to be friends with nice women, they’re simply not as interesting. 

Mind was blown, okay? A simple sentiment and yet, I thought of Carli in Good Morning, Love and how maybe she wasn’t as edgy as she could have been. Carli was a nice girl, and while I think it worked in the context of the story, I know that I can push myself a little more as I continue to develop as a writer.  

I must admit, my characters become real people for me and at the times where I’ve needed to add more conflict or dissension, I hesitate. I don’t want to hurt them. Yes, I’m aware this sounds nuts, but I have to remind myself that storytelling is about drama. It’s about creating tension and release, or else you are going to snooze your audience to death. An interesting thing that came out of writing Good Morning, Love was how there were people who didn’t like Tau. Here I thought I was writing this suave, confident character and some of the reviews were like, “he was too aggressive and toxic.” HA! Meanwhile, he was my kind of guy. But what I realize is that maybe, Tau was a bit more flushed out in a way than Carli in my execution.

With my current work in progress, I would say that the main character is much more complex but he is male and let’s be frank here, we are a lot more accepting of unlikable men than women. He also feels like more of the anti-hero. His arc certainly lands him in a more balanced place. He is flawed, but not exactly a villain. I don’t know the science of it, but I know anecdotally that men get a lot more passes than us. As women, we are often expected to be more palatable, agreeable, and otherwise likable to the masses.  

In recent years, one of the women that stuck out to me as unlikable in my reading was Feyi from You Made a Fool of Death With Your Beauty by Akwaeke Emezi. They did an amazing job of writing Feyi really well, but I did not like sis. While she was managing her grief, I felt like she made it everyone else’s nightmare and completely disregarded everyone's feelings except her own. But it was a testament that we can write extremely complex characters that everyone may not like, but still have the ability to tell a fantastic story. That book remains one of my favorites over the last couple of years, and there was no one in particular I was rooting for. 

Now, personally, my character will probably need some type of redeemable quality, but I don’t even think that’s necessary all the time. The reality is, in life, there are some people that just aren’t that likable, and they have stories to be told as well. If our work is a reflection of that, then occasionally they may show up in our novels. 

As with most things, it’s certainly a balance though so there is an art to approaching our unlikable characters. First, are the aforementioned redeemable qualities. So, they hate people, but they’re exceptionally nice to animals. This shows us that the person has some kind of soft spot and is not simply deranged. 

Giving them moments of vulnerability. Sure, they may be terrorizing everyone in the story, but there are those points in the story where we get that small peak behind the curtain. With my work in progress, one of the antagonists had a hard childhood and lost his brother at an early age. While we can still disagree with someone’s behavior, it helps us shift from why are they like this to what happened to make them like this?

Give them a cause. Here I think of Thanos in Endgame who, depending on how you look at it, maybe some people could have seen his point. He thought what he was doing was right by getting rid of half of the population. While we may not agree, it can be the job of the writer to set it up in a way where your reader can say, “I don’t agree, but maybe I understand.”

Make them decisive in their bad choices. It can be easy to simply make the character complain or whine the whole time but stories need actions, so it’s important to have them make choices throughout the story, whether for better or worse. However, we get to experience the consequences with them, which makes things interesting. 

I feel charged and challenged to take this on. To write someone who may not be so likable and see what their character arc may bring. I don’t know if it’s a full on novel or if I may want to explore this through a short story, but it feels like a good mission especially being in a space where I’m so uncertain about what I want to write next. 

Do you think about ways that you may want to challenge yourself in your own work? 

Katie Krzaczek wants your pitches for the business section at Slate. Send your smart ideas on the products we use, the money we spend, the trends we love (and hate!), the weird thing you can’t stop thinking about (especially this pls): katie.krzaczek@slate.com. 

Prairie Schooner is accepting submissions for their Creative Nonfiction Summer Essay contest, judged by Safiya Sinclair. (Aug .1) 

The Feminist Press is hiring three NY-based apprentices for their publishing apprenticeship program. $16/hr. (Apply by July 5).

Black Women’s History Series Incubator is accepting submissions for authors who are currently completing a book-length manuscript on Black women’s history. (July 1) 

The Atlantic is seeking an experienced senior editor to join the newsroom. This editor will be assigned to the Culture desk. The ideal candidate will be creative, versatile, highly organized, knowledgeable about several areas of pop culture, and well-read in magazine journalism. The position is full-time. ($100-160k, NY or D.C.) 

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NYLON is hiring a Freelance Music Writer. ($75/piece.) 

the craftAshley M. Colemanwriting, unlikable protagonists, Black writersComment