Top Ten Tuesday is a meme hosted by The Broke and the Bookish, featuring a different top 10 theme each week. This week’s topic is Ten Characters You Just Didn’t Click With.

This is a tough one. For me, this wouldn’t include the obviously bad eggs — I mean, we’re not intended to click with the villains, right? So I’m trying to come up with ten characters who are supposed to be important, sympathetic characters, people whose sides we’re meant to be on, but for whatever reason, I just never felt the love…. or at least, not right away.

Here we go:

Seven whom I just never really liked:

1. Gale Hawthorne (The Hunger Games): I was definitely Team Peeta, but even at the very beginning, Gale just didn’t particularly appeal to me, and he never did grow on me either.
2. Eragon (Eragon): Eragon’s a bit of a jerk, IMHO. He doesn’t listen to people who obviously know better, he keeps getting his friends into mortal danger, and he’s kind of careless with his magic. I love Saphira the dragon, but maybe the fact that the title character of the series doesn’t appeal to me is part of the reason why I haven’t felt compelled to continue reading the rest of the books.
3. Margo (Paper Towns) and …
4. Alaska (Looking for Alaska): I don’t like these wild child girl characters, the mysterious free-spirited untameable special ones who set the boys next door spinning in their orbits. Just, no. (As you can imagine, these books just didn’t work for me.)
5. Marguerite Blakeney (The Scarlet Pimpernel): It seems as though every chapter in this book has to remind us that Marguerite is the most beautiful and clever woman in all of Europe. I found her kind of insufferable, which is too bad, considering she’s the heroine.
6. Bella Swan (Twilight): Does this one even need explanation? I just wanted her to grown a spine and stop throwing her life away. Oh well.
7. Anyone from The Raven Boys: Don’t shoot me. I know people love this series. But when I read the first book, the characters all kind of mushed together for me and none of them made me care about them as individuals.

And three who became favorites — but it took me a while:

1. Margaret Hale (North and South): I’m still reading this book, so I have no definitive opinions yet. Margaret starts out as highly snobby and prejudiced, but she’s really improving! I didn’t click with her at first, but now I really like her.
2. Jo March (Little Women): Jo is meant to be the stand-in for the author and the one readers really connect with. I think my problem was that I read Little Women when I was a bit too young. Jo’s stubbornness and trouble-making streak didn’t appeal to me then; I was more smitten with Beth’s unwavering goodness. (This all changed when I re-read Little Women as a teen, because who wants to be good as gold as a teen-aged girl? Raising a little hell was much more enticing at that point.)
3. Fanny Price (Mansfield Park): Like Margaret Hale, Fanny Price really grew on me during the novel. I had a hard time seeing past her meek ways and her constant frailness, but I ended up really admiring her inner strength as the book progressed. So while I didn’t click with Fanny right away, by the end, I thought she was terrific.

Yes, eventually, for these three I’d have to say:

Are any of my characters on  your list this week? Or have I included anyone about whom you feel completely the opposite?

Share your links, please, and I’ll come check out your top 10!

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Do you host a book blog meme? Do you participate in a meme that you really, really love? I host a Book Blog Meme Directory, and I’m always looking for new additions! If you know of a great meme to include — or if you host one yourself — please drop me a note on my Contact page and I’ll be sure to add your info!