First of all everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but I don’t agree with you when u say that Edward’s love for Bella showed up out of the blue. If anything Edward’s love for Bella developed, from him wanting to kill her and hating the fact that she was there--making it very difficult for him to keep pretending they were very normal. Edward's struggle with being around Bella was, in my opinion, his internal struggle to realizing he loved her. Once they realized they were both in love with each other, their relationship did seem to go pretty fast, but at the same time it felt as if they needed to take every step in the relationship very slowly. Edward also values Bella’s opinion more than anything. He constantly proves that in the end of New Moon and all throughout Eclipse. He agrees to turn Bella into a vampire, for example, even though he strongly is against it. Along the same lines, Edward tells Bella that if she chooses Jacob he would step aside. Edward does value Bella’s opinion because he wants her to be happy. On the other hand, I know there are parts in the books that Edward seems “controlling”, but I think he is so fearful of Bella being in danger because of his fault much like in Twilight. He loves her so much he doesn’t want anything bad to happen to her. Ian sometimes went into protective mode with Wanderer too, but he was stopped because of Jeb’s gun.
Don’t get me wrong I like Ian too. He won me over when he brought Wanderer Cheetos (seriously I loved that part & I prefer Ian over Jared). I agree with you on the fact that Ian is warmer, but only to a center extend. I mean you have to take into consideration that Edward is a vampire who is always haunted by the instinct to kill the person he most loves in the world. Edward is warm to Bella, but to a certain extend because he knows the danger it was to get close to her since the beginning.
On a different track, I don’t agree with you that Ian is realistic. I mean he fell in love with Wanderer: who is an alien trapped in Melanie’s body, with Melanie still inside, and who both Wanderer and Melanie are in love with Jared. I don’t think Ian is realistic. I think he was a man who was in love and saw the beauty in Wanderer when a lot of the humans still didn’t, but Ian seemed to fit the category of a man being in love, but not the one of a realistic man.
Regardless of everything, Ian and Edward are both fictional characters who were fighting against fate when they fell in love with people outside of their species.