  We examine the motion of charged particles in gravitational and
electro-magnetic background fields. We study in particular the deviation of
world lines, describing the relative acceleration between particles on
different space-time trajectories. Two special cases of background fields are
considered in detail: (a) pp-waves, a combination of gravitational and
electro-magnetic polarized plane waves travelling in the same direction; (b)
the Reissner-Nordstr{\o}m solution. We perform a non-trivial check by computing
the precession of the periastron for a charged particle in the
Reissner-Nordstr{\o}m geometry both directly by solving the geodesic equation,
and using the world-line deviation equation. The results agree to the order of
approximation considered.
