We'll be the first to admit that being a teenager is pretty rough. Acne, battling with hormones, battling with frenemies, battling with parents, thinking you're right about everything only to be told constantly that you're wrong. It's the worst.
That being said, once you reach adulthood, you realize how annoying you were as a teenager, and often look back on this time period with mortification and regret about all the horrible things you said and did (sorry, Mom!).
While we do think that all of the following teens are ridiculously annoying, we feel their pain. If we could talk to them in person, we'd tell them it gets better in their thirties (since being a twenty-something is relatively close to being a teen these days).
These are the most annoying teenagers in books (NOTE: Some of these characters start off younger and also grow older than teens in these books, but if they are at any point a teenager in the book, that counts for us):
Holden Caulfield from J.D. Salinger's The Catcher in the Rye: Whine, whine, whine. We feel so sorry for you that you're rich and in expensive boarding school. It must be really, really hard. If Holden were a real adult person and this were his teenage memoir, he would be so embarrassed that he'd ever published this.
Bella Swan from Stephenie Meyer's Twilight series: Could anyone be more annoying? She's completely self-obsessed. Really, all she talks about or thinks about is Edward (their relationship is a problem on its own). It's honestly surprising that she manages to maintain any friendships. Bella needs to buck up in book one, work on her self-esteem issues, and break off her unhealthy relationship with Edward. Unfortunately, she doesn't. And things only continue to go downhill with her likability from there. ALSO, PLEASE STOP BITING YOUR LOWER LIP.
Joffrey Baratheon from George R.R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire series: Joffrey is essentially the main example for why it's important to give children boundaries. He's easily angered, particularly when he doesn't get his way. He is irrational and reckless, which causes him to make bad judgements. But above all, he is one mean, sadistic kid. He has no problem killing people (or, rather, having people killed) on a whim, and he takes pleasure in seeing it done. We actually think this is one exception to the "oh, he'll just grow out of it" rule.
Marianne Dashwood from Jane Austen's Sense and Sensibility: Marianne, like most typical teenagers, is extremely self-centered. She's obsessed with passion and romance and spends all of her time thinking about herself and her love affairs. She externalizes all of her emotions, so after Willoughby leaves her, she just cries all the time and mopes around all day, causing her family to suffer along with her. She is very flirtatious and publicly affectionate, and refuses to tone down her public displays toward Willoughby, even though it embarrasses her family (and turns out to be even more embarrassing when he doesn't end up marrying her).
Harry Potter from J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter series: We love Harry Potter as much as the next person, but he definitely goes through some annoying phases. Being "The Chosen One" and all, he has a tendency to think he's always right about everything. We understand that he was under way more pressure than the average teenager by the fifth book, but God, he really gets intolerable. He turns into a horrible hormonal adolescent ragemonster at the expense of everyone around him. But don't worry, Harry Potter fans! He grows out of it!
Amy March from Louisa May Alcott's Little Women: Who doesn't hate Amy March? Remember how she throws all of Jo's writing in the fire?! Oh, didn't you just want to slap her in her little smug face? And then she grows up to marry Laurie, which is just so, so wrong on so, so many levels. Ugh, Amy. Didn't falling through the ice teach you anything?
Oscar Wao from Junot Diaz's The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao: Sure, Oscar becomes lovable in the reader's eyes (when he grows up), but he is certainly very annoying. He constantly feels sorry for himself because he doesn't have a girlfriend. All he can focus on is his inability to find love. He consistently pursues girls who have absolutely no interest in him whatsoever and then feels sorry for himself some more when it doesn't work out the way he'd envisioned. Luckily, in this book, we see Oscar into his 20s, where he gets less annoying. We definitely cried when he dies at the end (not really a spoiler... see: the title of the book).
Lydia Bennet from Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice: Both Lydia and Kitty are the absolute worst. Lydia basically throws herself at every man, and eventually runs off with the horrible Wickham (after her mother allows her to go stay in an army camp full of men. Good job, Mom!). Wickham, scoundrel that he is, says that he won't marry Lydia unless he's given a good amount of money, which obviously the Bennets can't afford. Mr. Darcy steps in and saves the day, providing the money so that the two can get married and save Lydia and her family from scandal. Unfortunately for Lydia, she is stuck with this jerk for life, and will pay for for her boy craziness/compulsiveness for forever.
Romeo AND Juliet from William Shakespeare's "Romeo and Juliet": Oh, come on, guys. Why did you rush into marriage without even knowing each other?! These two characters really embody the idea of the overly dramatic teen to a T. They meet at a party (that Romeo only goes to in hopes of seeing a DIFFERENT girl), and are secretly married the very next day, despite their families having an ongoing, bloody feud. Yikes. The eventually end up killing themselves needlessly (Romeo in part because of his particularly spontaneous behavior; he believes Juliet to be dead, even though she's not, and immediately kills himself). Really, all of this could have been avoided. Couldn't they have gotten to know each other better, and maybe been the bridge that brought the families back together (alive, rather than dead)? Unfortunately, teens are not very logical people.