Obsessed with Fictional Characters

Have you ever read a book that just speaks to you? What about characters that keep coming to mind in your everyday life? I run into these problems on a fairly regular basis. At times, I find myself looking up movies or television shows or even books mentioned by characters in other books. Those who have watched the 2007 film, “The Jane Austen Book Club” know what I am talking about. Some characters just latch on in my psyche and don’t let go. I recently found myself watching the television show, “Storage Wars,” because it was mentioned repeatedly in a book I recently finished reading and I’ve added “Summer Nights” by Van Halen to my summer playlist on my IPod after it was noted in another recently finished book. But there are some books and some characters that I cannot get enough of nor seem to get enough of re-reading their stories.

My recent obsession has been with Pamela Clare’s “Breaking Point” novel, part of the I-Team series. It is the story of U.S. Chief Deputy Marshal, former Navy SEAL, and Medal of Honor recipient, Zach McBride and Investigative journalist Natalie Benoit. I absolutely love the heroes of the I-Team series but Zach has truly become my absolute favorite. As far as heroines go, Natalie is at the top as well. Their love story is one that pulls at my heart strings. I have re-read this book dozens and dozens of times (I am not exaggerating here at all) and I have the audiobook downloaded on my IPod so I can listen to Kaleo Griffith tell their story while I work around the house, painting, cutting the grass, etc. This is truly my favorite romance novel of all time; so far, the next I-Team book is set to be released in November 2013.

I find that reading “Breaking Point,” while it resets my book hangover, also serves as a great palate cleanser after reading one or more mediocre or disappointing books. I find it helpful after reading a lot of intense theoretical or biographical nonfiction as well.

There are some characters that appear in multiple books within a series that continue to cross my mind as well, namely Vic Carponti of Jessica Scott’s “Because of You” and “Anything For You” novels. Keep in mind, Carponti is a secondary character in all of these stories but he will be getting his own novella this Christmas and I cannot wait! Carponti has the best sense of humor and I have a lot of his dialogue bookmarked on my kindle to look at when I need a little cheering up.

When I look at the range of fictional characters that call me back to their stories, some of the traits that they share include their protective nature, courage, they tend to be wounded in some way, physically or emotionally, and finally they are very passionate about their work, their love interest, their hobbies, etc. I also like intense heroes, which is why Shane Garrison from “Because of You” and “Anything for You” by Jessica Scott is also among my favorite heroes. As far as wounded souls are concerned, Kayne Dobrescu of “Razing Kayne” by Julieanne Reeves tops the list. In addition to Pamela Clare’s I-Team series, there are series that have so many amazing heroes that it becomes difficult for me to rate them although I do tend to revisit them on occasion, including Julie Ann Walker’s BKI series, Lori Foster’s Men Who Walk the Edge of Honor and Love Undercover series, and Maya Banks’ KGI series. [By the way on the Favorites page of this site, I have hyperlinks to the author pages of the authors I have mentioned here]

What about you? What books or characters do you find yourself re-reading or thinking about? What characteristics draw these characters to you?