Why do you need to like the protagonist?

Do you need to like the characters to like the book?Actually, let's go back a step...

DO you need to like the protagonist in a book?

The reason I'm asking is because I was speaking at a book group the other week and we had a fairly lively discussion about whether we ended up rating a book less highly if we didn't like the protagonist. I was firmly in the camp of not needing to like the protagonist to enjoy a book and to rate it highly; others around the table felt that if they didn't warm to the protagonist, they didn't enjoy the book and so didn't rate the book so highly.

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