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Good plot is important, but I need to have at least one character to care about in order to really love a book. A book can have the best writing (stylistically) and most intricate plot ever, but if it doesn't have any characters for me to be intrigued by, to cheer (or boo) for, to want to know how they will fare, to "feel" them as real people (doesn't have to be humans!), it will never be a "five star book" for me.
So, yeah, relatable characters are important. I don't think I'd really be interested in a book from a POV of an irredeemably evil character - I want at least something to like, to go with any nastiness - but I don't need a perfectly "good" character either.
Preferably I'd like to have a small but well defined cast of flawed but relatable, interesting characters who feel like real people with back stories and relationships (I don't by that mean "I want to read romance" but friendships, competition, family or what not at least for some of the people involved). I don't really care for characters being there just as props for the plot, who feel like flat pieces of cardboard (or bundles of clichés and stereotypes) who are there to move the plot along but don't come off as rounded or realistic.
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