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3.88 AVERAGE
3.88 AVERAGE
emotional
lighthearted
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Typical Nicholas Sparks book. An entertaining easy read! One of my favorites so far.
Nothing spectacular but kept my interest. Pretty predictable but fun summer reading.
Doesn't get really good until almost the very end. The dead-beat dad should've done some more sleazy things to really pull the reader in. A nice story for people who stick to strict nice-story regimens. Not that anything is wrong with that :)
Actual Rating: 2.5 stars
Logan Thibault finds a photograph of a woman with a message on the back reading "keep safe" in the aftermath of a firefight. Said find saves his life and and the photo becomes his good luck charm. So, after his tour of duty is over, Logan treks all the way from Colorado to North Carolina where he finds the woman in the photograph and so the story begins.
Now, I'll give sparks some credit, this book was better than The Notebook. He actually takes time to develop the relationship of Beth and Logan so we the reader can feel a bit more sympathy for them as they undergo the trials of falling in love. That was better done and the writing is less purple this time around. The brisk pacing and better writing made for a quicker read and I'll also say that while the novel had it's moments of sappiness, it was less choking than previous Sparks books I've read before. So all in all, he did show some improvement. I admit, the fixation on Beth, even if it is a Sparks novel, did sort of remind me of an episode of Criminal Minds. Not any episode specifically, but I could so see the selfsame premise being used on the show. It is sort of weird to me, a dude trekking all the way across the country on foot to find a woman he's never seen, spoken to and seen only in a picture for years.
However, I'll let that go and accept the premise (this time) as a set up for a fairly charming novel. It was a nice, light, breezy read. Better than The Notebook, hence my two and a half-star rating, but again, this book was not without it's flaws, which is what I'll be getting into now. Mild spoilers ahead.
First off, our main man, Logan-I took issue with him for one reason.
Guess what, if someone told Logan that, it would be true. This guy can do anything. Fix fences, fix tractors, play piano, train dogs-he is good at everything he does. He has no struggles. Sure, he has PTSD from his time in Iraq, but Sparks doesn't treat this is as the serious condition that it is. The PTSD is a plot device and nothing more. That, to me was cheap. How could Beth resist him (even if walking all the way across the country to find her is a tiny bit creepy when you think about it)? He's so perfect, charming and capable. The total opposite of Beth's ex-husband and father of her child, Ben.
That was another issue I had with this book, in addition to making Logan flawless, the ex husband was a complete asshole.
Being blunt, that's lazy. Because of course, having more than one strong, capable and good role model in Ben's life is impossible. There can only be one.
It's a bad attempt to make Logan seem like a good guy, but I've said it a hundred times and I'll say it a hundred times more: you don't have to surround your main character with bad, shitty people to make them awesome. The awesomeness of another character does not take away from the awesomeness of the main character.
And yeah, I suppose Keith (the ex) gets his redemption at the end when he and Logan work together to save Ben and Keith subsequently dies in the attempt, showing that despite his flaws, he did truly love his son. However, I still call foul. Beth (the love interest) was not a character who a reader will hate, but honestly, she's not one you'll like either. She's just there. Outside of her role as love interest and mom, nothing really defines her character. Oh, I suppose her mourning the loss of her brother who was also in the Army and original owner of her photograph. But that's my problem with her, despite being such a major character, nothing defines her, save her roles with other people. She has no hobbies of her own, no talents or interests to speak of. Nothing.
So yeah, all in all, far better than some other Sparks books I've read, but still heavy on many familiar flaws of the author. Good for a one-time, quick afternoon read, but if you ever take a look at it again, it'll show that it doesn't really stand up to re-reading.
Logan Thibault finds a photograph of a woman with a message on the back reading "keep safe" in the aftermath of a firefight. Said find saves his life and and the photo becomes his good luck charm. So, after his tour of duty is over, Logan treks all the way from Colorado to North Carolina where he finds the woman in the photograph and so the story begins.
Now, I'll give sparks some credit, this book was better than The Notebook. He actually takes time to develop the relationship of Beth and Logan so we the reader can feel a bit more sympathy for them as they undergo the trials of falling in love. That was better done and the writing is less purple this time around. The brisk pacing and better writing made for a quicker read and I'll also say that while the novel had it's moments of sappiness, it was less choking than previous Sparks books I've read before. So all in all, he did show some improvement. I admit, the fixation on Beth, even if it is a Sparks novel, did sort of remind me of an episode of Criminal Minds. Not any episode specifically, but I could so see the selfsame premise being used on the show. It is sort of weird to me, a dude trekking all the way across the country on foot to find a woman he's never seen, spoken to and seen only in a picture for years.
However, I'll let that go and accept the premise (this time) as a set up for a fairly charming novel. It was a nice, light, breezy read. Better than The Notebook, hence my two and a half-star rating, but again, this book was not without it's flaws, which is what I'll be getting into now. Mild spoilers ahead.
First off, our main man, Logan-I took issue with him for one reason.
Guess what, if someone told Logan that, it would be true. This guy can do anything. Fix fences, fix tractors, play piano, train dogs-he is good at everything he does. He has no struggles. Sure, he has PTSD from his time in Iraq, but Sparks doesn't treat this is as the serious condition that it is. The PTSD is a plot device and nothing more. That, to me was cheap. How could Beth resist him (even if walking all the way across the country to find her is a tiny bit creepy when you think about it)? He's so perfect, charming and capable. The total opposite of Beth's ex-husband and father of her child, Ben.
That was another issue I had with this book, in addition to making Logan flawless, the ex husband was a complete asshole.
Being blunt, that's lazy. Because of course, having more than one strong, capable and good role model in Ben's life is impossible. There can only be one.
It's a bad attempt to make Logan seem like a good guy, but I've said it a hundred times and I'll say it a hundred times more: you don't have to surround your main character with bad, shitty people to make them awesome. The awesomeness of another character does not take away from the awesomeness of the main character.
And yeah, I suppose Keith (the ex) gets his redemption at the end when he and Logan work together to save Ben and Keith subsequently dies in the attempt, showing that despite his flaws, he did truly love his son. However, I still call foul. Beth (the love interest) was not a character who a reader will hate, but honestly, she's not one you'll like either. She's just there. Outside of her role as love interest and mom, nothing really defines her character. Oh, I suppose her mourning the loss of her brother who was also in the Army and original owner of her photograph. But that's my problem with her, despite being such a major character, nothing defines her, save her roles with other people. She has no hobbies of her own, no talents or interests to speak of. Nothing.
So yeah, all in all, far better than some other Sparks books I've read, but still heavy on many familiar flaws of the author. Good for a one-time, quick afternoon read, but if you ever take a look at it again, it'll show that it doesn't really stand up to re-reading.
This was good - typical Nicholas Sparks - but not as good as some of his others and reminded me of Message in a Bottle at times. I can see this making a pretty good movie though, and I was definitely holding my breath at the end waiting to find out what happened.
It's not bad, it just feels very mid to me and I don't have the drive to finish it.
As always, this Nicholas Sparks book was entertaining and kept my attention. The idea for the story and the plot line were poetic as usual. I didn't fall in love with these characters like I usually do, but this is also the first book of his I've read where the characters are outside of my own age bracket. Maybe that's why I couldn't connect to it as much. It was a great story though, and there's no doubting that Sparks is an excellent story-teller. Good solid summer beach read.
Predictable love story....perhaps I have simply read too much romance lately