How important is it that you can relate to the protagonists for you? I'm talking about stories with an actual plot, not stroke stories.
The last two stories I've read, I just finished the story but didn't really find any incentive to continue to the next book in the series because I couldn't really relate to the protagonist.
In one of them, the protagonists mother confessed to him that she had cheated on his father for years with her brother until the father found out. His father was really hurt by that, and although they stayed together, the brother wasn't allowed to come to the house again, and the father was still upset about it 20 years later where the story takes place, so he was obviously very hurt by the mother. So the mother is telling the protagonist, her son, about it, pleading to him to forgive her, asking him to please understand that she loved her brother and he had a really big cock which she really needed (this wasn't a stroke story, most sex after the first time was just "and we had sex that night").
So while reading, I was expecting him to really blow up. I mean, putting myself in his shoes, if my mother told me how she cheated on my father with her brother for years because she liked his big cock, and my father was obviously hurting 20 years later, I'd be fucking pissed at her for betraying him and hurting him so bad. Instead, the first thing he says when his mother asks him if he can forgive her, he just says something like "There's nothing to forgive on my part" and that's all. I mean yeah, the father is the one that needs to forgive her, but to not be upset at all knowing how badly she hurt his own father (who he had a great relationship with by the way) for such a shallow reason as she needed a bigger cock? I mean, he's not upset at all, he doesn't once think about how she hurt his father. He just goes, "Meh, whatever. By the way, how about that weather huh? Really cold outside today!"
That was so disappointing, and I guess it's one of my hangups that I can't let it go when protagonists doesn't react in a way that is logical to me.
The second story, the character was just so inconsistent. On one page he'd win verbal duels with doctors (the protagonist was a high school kid), he'd give really sound advice and generally act like a 30 year old. On the next page, he'd say or do something really inappropriate, saying something or doing something that a 10 year old would know better that to say/do.
Personally, it's super important that the protagonists in the stories I read act in a way that makes sense to me. I have a hard time taking a step back and just watch how the chaos plays out when the protagonist does something that's obviously stupid from my point of view. I can lay awake for hours just replaying it in my head thinking about what should have been done or should have been said. And then I'll mentally berate the protagonist for being stupid, and in some cases I won't pick it up again because I'm almost angry with the protagonist and want nothing to do with him.
So for me, it's very important to be able to relate to the protagonists on an almost personal level. Am I weird in doing this, or does others do the same thing?