Man, yes. I love how this series handles the whole love issue with them. And yeah, how -- how their devotion to each other (especially Hester's to Tom, eheh) kind of is a very bad thing for the rest of the world, and sometimes even a very bad thing for their relationship. I love relationships that are screwed up like this.

(No worries! The "hate = love" thing generally pisses me off too! Especially when that's the only qualifier factoring into the equation. Um. I'm pretty sure you said that already, and better than I did. But yes! Agreement. Any pairings I've got that have that dynamic in them also have lots of other reasons. At least, there are lots of other reasons in my mind.)

Another thing I really loved about them? They turned the whole gender role clichés on their head. Tom was the soft, sensitive one, Hester was kickass and scarred and hard. And it's awesome.