What We Talk About When We Talk About Love Characters

Mel is the main character, the guy doing most of the talking in this story. We learn right away that he's is a cardiologist, a heart doctor, a heart surgeon, in fact. He takes his job seriously. He...

Over the first bottle of gin, Mel and Terri tell the story of Terri's ex, a man named Ed, who "loved [Terri] so much he tried to kill her" (4).As they drink, we learn that Ed beat Terri, tried to k...

Newlywed Nick is our narrator. He mostly reports on the conversation and the amount of gin left in the bottle at any given moment. He is Mel's best friend and might be a lawyer, since he met his wi...

Laura is thirty-five years old and recently married to Nick. We don't get to know her much because she doesn't say much, and Nick isn't interested in describing her. He's too busy with Mel. For muc...

Mel offers the story of this couple as his example of true love, and as a contrast to Terri's story of Ed's love for her:I'd get up to his mouth-hole […] and he'd say no, it wasn't the accident e...