Miles Boise Bennell
Miles is the main character in the book and is definitely the "good guy". He is a twenty-eight year old doctor who has been practicing for just over a year and has taken over his father's old practice in Mill Valley, California. He has a large number of patients partly because of his farher's excellent record and partly because of Miles's own easy manner and like ability. Miles was born and raised in Mill Valley and so knows most of the older folk in town as well as his peers with whom he graduated high school. Miles is recently divorced which in part explains his reluctance to begin a relationship with old flame Becky Driscoll. Miles knows his own mind which is extremely important in the face of so many people telling him that the best explanation for what he is seeing in Mill Valley is mass hysteria. He wants desperately to believe this but knows deep down he does not. He sets great stock in friendship which is why he is careful to whom he reaches out, but is also naive as he does not for one moment imagine that his old buddy Mannie has already become the enemy. Much of the time Miles chooses not to see what he does not want to acknowledge, for example, not wanting to openly admit to Jack that he sees something that is not right about the body of the man on Jack's billiard table.
Miles is protective of Becky, and although he does not want to get into a relationship so soon after his divorce, he persuades himself that the time they are spending together is merely for reasons of safety; he tells himself that he does not want Becky to be staying at his house but secretly is glad that she is there. Miles is ultimately very brave and is willing to sacrifice himself for the good of the future citizens of Mill Valley, and although setting fire to the pods means that he and Becky are discovered Miles believes it is the right thing to do as he is literally saving the world.
Becky Driscoll
Becky and Miles have dated before and Becky feels more comfort in his company than in anyone else's primarily because she feels that they have a shared experience in the disappointment of having failed at marriage, Becky's divorce also being fairly recent. She is pretty but slightly overweight although Miles finds this very attractive. She is actually very smart, resourceful and made of stern stuff. Despite her almost palpable fear she escapes with Miles after she devises their escape plan, and her quick thinking means that they now can save the planet by setting fire to the pods. She is very tough despite being terrified. It is Becky who first brings the claims of people thinking their loved one is not their loved one anymore to Miles, essentially starting the ball rolling into investigating matters further.
Jack Belicec
Jack interrupts Miles and Becky at the movies because he has found a body that does not seem right, and wants miles to come and take a look at it to see if he draws the same conclusions about it. Jack is a writer, and a collector of clippings about strange phenomena, such as the day it rained frogs. However he also has clippings about a collection of giant seed pods that seemed unexplained and is the catalyst for their believing that something almost paranormal is going on in Mill Valley. Jack is a courageous and loyal friend which he shows time and again with his actions. The best example of this us at there end of the story, when he is in his car being pursued by the enemy and drives pastMiles andBecky so they can see for themselves that Jack is distracting the enemy and tricking the enemy into thinking that he is basically adhering to what was said in the telephone conversation with Miles earlier. Jack is one of the few left with emotions and genuine emotions.
Theodora Belicec
Theodora is Miles' wife and the character more mentally affected by what is happening around them. When the body is in the billiard room she is nervous and understandably reluctant to be on her own in the house with it there. She also has the misfortune of checking on the body when it is taking on the form of Jack and almost looses her mind because what she has seen is simply too terrible to comprehend. Although when the four of them are together she is relaxed and confident this is not the case when they have split into two couples. She is barely functioning due to her terror and does extremely well to keep herself together at all.
Dr Manfred Kaufman (Mannie)
Mannie and Miles are friends but unlike Miles, Mannie is a psychologist and rarely troubled by patients in the middle of the night, unlike Miles, who now delights in calling him and yanking him from slumber. Mannie is a verbal joker but not a prankster. He is utterly trustworthy but unfortunately by the time Miles telephones him to appraise him of the situation he has already been "snatched" and consequently everything he says and does is intended to explain away the body and also the patients complaining that lived ones are not the same people anymore; his objective is to make Miles think he has overreacted and forgotten to apply the logic of medicine to everything. He still has his skill as a psychologist but it is now coupled with manipulative was and a cunning determined to dupe Miles and facilitate his "snatching" as well.
Wilma
Wilma is the person who was the catalyst for Miles and Jack realizing something was very wrong in Mill Valley. Although given to over-emotional behavior she is acting in a rather paranoid manner and insisting that her Uncle Ira is not her Uncle Ira but an imposter. He looks, speaks and seems the same but she doesn't feel emotion in him at all. Later, Wilma retracts her assertions about her uncle but this is because she, too, has been snatched and is no longer the same Wilma either.
