I’ve been thinking about my book collection lately and the books that I’m willing to re-read. Most of them have a lot of sarcasm and gentle ribbing between the main characters. One of the early series of books I picked up, and read many times, was David Edding’s Belgariad. He did such a good job of making bickering into an endearing interplay between his characters.

I realized that this carries over into TV shows and movies that I find re-playable as well.  Joss Whedon is the master of building snappy rejoinders into very solid interplay between characters.  It is an art form to take memorable one-liners and plentiful sarcasm and build a family among your characters.There’s a fine line between smart and friendly animosity and just plain mean-spirited whining. I don’t like the later, and authors who can’t distinguish between the two are generally not worth my time. I don’t really like the clown either, but I do respect stories that find a balance between tension and humor.

So here is to the well-played snappy rejoinder, the appropriately placed sarcastic comment, and the well-balanced argumentative team. Your gentle ribbing and humor have endeared you to me:

Skeeve and Aahz, Vlad Taltos, Silk, Polgara, Harry Dresden, Bob, Sergeant Kerr, Flinx, Mercy Thompson, Corwin, John Critchton, Jack O’Neal, G’Kar and Londo Mollari, Buffy, Malcolm Reynolds, and many more…