I am a reader who has to have character chemistry. It doesn't matter how much I love a good story line, if I don't feel connected to the characters or find their chemistry believable than what started off as a great read for me, has now become an okay read. For me character chemistry makes or breaks the story. Sophie & I like to use the excuse, "it's okay, we're moms" to talk about anything and everything. Lately it seems like we've talked a lot about character chemistry, because you know we have nothing better to do. *snickers* In between the car pool lane, cleaning toilets, folding clothes and prepping for meals, our minds tend to wonder to our favorite book moments, which tend to have hot character chemistry, swoon worthy kissy scenes and moments that take our breath away.
There's something about those those stolen moments, first loves, that first kiss or gentle touch that turn us into a our former teen selves. We do that inner girl squeal when our favorite characters finally get together. Since we're moms, we also mentally tell the our favorite lead male that we're watching him and if he breaks our favorite heroine's heart, than our other mom side will come out and he'll regret it. We get swept away in reading about our favorite characters falling in love, and relate to the range of emotions they've feeling. We relate to them and also want to protect them from the impending heartache we know is bound to happen at some point, and we're hopefully that things quickly get back to normal after they make up.
Here's a few of the books/series (in no particular order) that Sophie and I often discuss when we're talking about Character Chemistry 101. This is of course only a small fraction of the books we talk about. For the sake of a long, boring post, here's our list of 5 books/series that have character chemistry that totally swept us off our feet.
* The Mortal Instruments/Infernal Devices series by Cassandra Clare
- I totally cheated and listed two series, because I can't pick one book. It doesn't matter if the characters are good or really evil, there's something about the way Cassie writes her characters that makes me love them, and understand them, even if I don't agree with their motives. She makes us fall in love with her characters no matter how broken they are, and allows us to understand the motives behind the ones that are evil. She breaks our heart, fixes it up again, has us sighing, laughing, crying, and when we finish her books, she has us feeling like I'm saying good bye to an old friend.
* Anna & the French Kiss by Stephanie Perkins
- She created the most fabulous, realistic, believable relationship between Anna and St. Clair. They were just normal, imperfect people who had this amazing chemistry that made us want to push them together from the moment they met. We love how their relationship developed and grew. It made us feel like we were there watching two friends' fall in love with each other.
* The Heist Society & The Gallagher Girls series by Ally Carter
- Oh Hale! Sophie and I often talk about the fabulous chemistry that Ally creates with her characters. It's done in the subtle may the characters move around each other, the stolen glances, the knowing each other so painfully well that hooks both of us with this series. Not that we don't like a good make out scene, but wow Ally knows how to deliver hot without it being all steamy.
* The Firelight series by Sophie Jordan
- I should just say Cassian & Will and many of you would know what I'm talking about. I adore these two guys and the chemistry they have with Jacinda. This chemistry literally melted the pages of my book (ok not really, but it was sure hot). This love triangle has one hot, swoon worthy chemistry that leaves me wanting more.
* The Curse Workers series by Holly Black
- Holly just makes us want to lock her characters into a room and let them have their moment together without the curses. How can we not love the chemistry between Cassel and Lila. It's so painfully obvious how they both feel about each other, and yet they both have to keep their distance, which just kills us, but it also leaves us enjoying their stolen glances and secretive moments together that much more. Plus, how can we not love a bad boy who's just trying to do the right thing.
We of course can't just list 5 favorites. Here's some of our other favorites:
- The Iron Fey series by Julie Kagawa
- The Hourglass series by Myra McEntire
- Haunting Emma series by Lee Nichols
- The Unearthly series by Cynthia Hand
- The River of Time series by Lisa T Bergren
- Tempest Rising by Tracy Deebs
- Half Blood & Obsidian by Jennifer Armentrout
- Hex Hall series by Rachel Hawkins
- Delirium series by Lauren Oliver
- Die For Me series by Amy Plum
- The Nightshade series by Andrea Cremer
- The Vespertine by Saundra Mitchell
We of course have many more books to list, but I'd love to know what are some of your favorite books/series are that have an amazing character chemistry? Who are some of your favorite couples? Does character chemistry make or break a story for you?