Why Do Female Protagonists Have to be Likable?
Why Do Female Protagonists Have to be Likable?
Karina Cortés, the protagonist of my debut novel, ONE TOUGH COOKIE, has been called unlikable by many who’ve read the book. This was something I was aware of as I wrote, something I wanted her to be. Through all the rewrites, I kept her core personality intact, though I tried to give her more depth to at least give the reader an idea of where she was coming from. But I knew it was a risk, that it may hurt my chances of success. Female protagonists should be likable. But why? Why can’t they be flawed and make mistakes? And if the narrative is meant to cause them to change and grow, then why are we expecting them to be perfect from the get-go?
When I first got the idea for ONE TOUGH COOKIE, Karina was fully formed. She was confident, spoke her mind, and didn’t care what other people thought. But this also sometimes made her rude, mean, and insensitive. Since I wanted to be true to her character, I wrote everything that popped into my head and didn’t censor her.
Once I started getting feedback, everyone wanted to know more about why Karina acted the way she did. So I dug deeper into her backstory. She had past trauma with her estranged mother, which made her hide the ugliest parts of herself, afraid people wouldn’t like the real her. She pushed people away instead of being honest with them. This gave her more depth and made people relate to her better.
I signed with an agent, and she wanted me to go even deeper. She asked me to add a “save the cat” moment for Karina, afraid people would give up on the book before Karina had a chance to grow. Later, when I had a book deal, my editor asked me to cut some sections that made her way too unlikable. I budged on some but not all. I knew Karina was unlikable but that was who she was. She grows and changes as the book progresses, but in order to change, she needs to start at the other end of the spectrum. I can’t have her be mature and polite from the beginning when the point of the book is that she’s too judgmental and needs to learn to respect other people’s choices. She’s wrong most of the time. Other characters call her out on it. It seemed no matter how much I’d tried, I couldn’t get rid of the unlikability. But by this point, I was ready to lean into it. Karina’s unlikable. So are many other female protagonists I love, including Fleabag, Crazy Ex-Girlfriend’s Rebecca Bloom, and Sex and the City’s Carrie Bradshaw, who has been deemed TV’s first female anti-hero.
I love characters who push the boundaries of what is acceptable, who make me think differently. I’ve always tried to fit in, afraid of other people’s criticisms, but as I’ve aged, I’ve learned that the “haters gonna hate” no matter what you do. So for me, it was liberating to dig into Karina’s psyche as I wrote, to have her say and do things I would’ve never dared to.
I hope Karina can join the ranks of other unlikable female protagonists. Karina herself would probably love this label. After all, her signature quote is, “This is me, how I am. Deal with it.”
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Delise Torres grew up in Puerto Rico, watching telenovelas and re-enacting scenes with her Barbies. Once she outgrew her dolls, she turned to daydreaming, and it wasn’t until her late thirties when she finally put her own stories to paper, and her passion for writing was born.
She has a PhD in Food Science and former work experience as a quality assurance manager in the food industry. When not writing, you can find her trying to time-manage her life, singing, reading, and streaming shows and movies. She lives in Germany with her daughter and German husband. One Tough Cookie is her first novel.
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/torresdelise
Twitter: https://twitter.com/torresdelise
ONE TOUGH COOKIE
A Latina Fleabag committed to her carefree single life meets a sexy new mechanic determined to break through her defenses, in this humorous and heartfelt foodie women’s fiction set at a cookie company.
All cookies are made with love—even if twenty-seven-year-old Karina Cortés doesn’t believe in the concept. For her, a simple life with no attachments is a good life. And her life is indeed good—even with her biggest accomplishment being passing the GED exam. Karina is able to secure an incredible and well-paying job at Singular Cookies, Inc., a small family-owned cookie manufacturing plant in Fort Pierce, Florida. And although the founders of the company treat her like family, Karina insists she doesn’t need or want one. Not after her mother chose a man over her own daughter, pushing the young Karina to move out and make it on her own.
And she couldn’t be happier with her single life, unlike her friends, whose lives revolve around men.
Work and play collide when she meets the company’s hot new mechanic, Ian Feliciano, who stirs up feelings she tends to avoid. Karina knows she shouldn’t date him, but she’s strong; she’ll never turn pathetic like her friends or, especially, her mom. And with a looming plant inspection and trying to break up the CEO’s new romance, Karina has enough to distract herself.
As the inspection draws near and Karina battles her heart, she’ll have to decide whether to continue holding on to deeply ingrained beliefs that keep everyone at bay, or learn that love is not as dangerous as she fears and in the end, it is our history—our singular recipe—that shapes how we live.
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Category: Contemporary Women Writers, How To and Tips
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