Must characters be "likable"?

What's so appealing to so many reviewers about Lauren groff's fates and furies? Honesty n3 chapters in I have never met a band of less appealing characters - to a person (and it's hard to distinguish one person from another) they are a crowd of sybaritic spelt-centered narcissists - privileged vassar grads (most of them) wealthy (most of them) maybe a little talented and aspiring to careers in the arts but do any of them have an idea in their heads? Do they ever have an intelligent conversation ? Do they think for two seconds about the world we live in and how they might use their wealth and supposed talents to benefit others? In some ways this is a period piece. Groff's sets it in the early 90s - I would guess that seems a long time ago to her - but in any event she appears to examining another era almost another species. No doubt about it she writes well and there are quite a few passages and paragraphs that I have flagged as especially beautiful or trenchant. These for the most part are passages in which she lists the foibles and shortcomings of the members of the caste (sic). I am perfectly fine w an author's adopting a superior attitude to her characters but I do want to see some characters w spirit spunk ideas convictions relationships - other than partying hookups and complaints. Compare this with two obvious counterparts - Donna tartt's great the secret history in which we learn a lot about a complex group of college students and their ideas and desires and fates and foibles (tragic and criminal) or w the movie about similar wealthy Manhattan character a bit younger and in tha 70s I think - 'metropolitan not a great movie but one that won our sympathies thru its thuoughtful portrayal of a character who was an outsider yearning for acceptance in the little band but also a bit contemptuous of its values - as are we - but there was sweetness and innocence entirely missing in this novel