Unlikable

I accidentally wrote a book in a genre I had never read. Yes, it’s embarrassing. Let’s move past it.

Anyways, the last few weeks, I’ve been scrambling to read as many New Adult romance and New Adult contemporary books as I can to rectify this problem. From what I can gather, it seems like most of these books fall into the same pattern:

Guy is tortured/secretive and hot

Girl may or may not have her own demons

They meet

Girl is attracted to guy because he is both sexy and mysterious

Guy is attracted to girl for some reason (we’ll get back to this)

Conflict

Twist (hopefully)

They end up together

HEA

All you avid readers are probably like, “Obviously. That’s how the romance genre works.” And that makes sense. I don’t want to read the last page of a Coleen Hoover novel to find that the love interest dies or something else awful (OMG, if this happens in one of her books, don’t tell me. I’m still working my way through them.).

But, I’ve noticed that, even in the best written, most binge-worthy reads, the female protagonists tend to be likable, more or less moral, and known by their circumstances more than their personalities. In other words, flat. Even the guys can’t really articulate what’s so great about these girls besides how they feel when they’re inside them.

For instance, in Ugly Love, which, was stylistically incredible and impossible to put down (I woke up at 5:30 in the morning and couldn’t go back to sleep until I finished the chapters I had remaining), I walked away feeling like I barely knew Tate besides the fact that she was a compassionate nurse/student who allowed a guy to use her for 10+ chapters.

Is this a hallmark of the genre? Is it normal for the romantic plotline to overshadow character development? This isn’t a critique. I’m really asking. I haven’t read enough of anything to know what I’m supposed to expect. Maybe the problem is that I keep hoping that I’ll open to the first page and read the female lead saying something like:

“I have a meanness inside me, real as an organ. Slit me at my belly and it might slide out, meaty and dark, drop on the floor so you could stomp on it.”

Or

“I didn’t stop giving hand jobs because I wasn’t good at it. I stopped giving hand jobs because I was the best at it.”

Of course, these aren’t the first lines of romance novels. They’re words from Gillian Flynn’s protagonists for Dark Places and The Grownup, respectively. Flynn knows how to write a character so real, that you feel like they exist outside the pages of the book. For instance:

Amy, Gone Girl: Selfish, cunning, manipulative but easily manipulated. Brilliant. Cold-blooded. Starved to be someone’s everything, but to be completely herself while doing so instead of the fictionalized version of herself that her parents created or that men create. Oh, did I mention, selfish?

Camille, Sharp Objects: self-inflicted pain, self-inflicted treatment to make up for her mom who neglected her for not accepting her “care.” Associates sex with violence. Desperately wants to find some redeemable quality in herself. Raised around sexism, racism, classism, with a weak father-figure.

Libby, Dark Places: Depressed. Assumes her self-worth is soiled by her blood relation to her brother who slaughtered her family. Desperate to survive but not dependable enough to make a reliable living for herself. Klepto-ish. Terrified to face the night of her family’s massacre, or any night, with the lights off.

Again, none of these women are in a romance novel. And, if they were, would we even be rooting for them? Or would we be hoping the guy rides off into the sunset with someone less crazy? Is it possible to have a complicated, even unlikable, protagonist in a mushy-gushy love story?

So, my question for you is, do you know of any romance novel starring a Camille or a Libby or an Amy? Think: someone you definitely don’t want to be friends with. I’m sure there are a ton, I just haven’t found them yet.

If you know of any, comment below because I want to read them.