Romance Annotation: The Notebook by Nicholas Sparks

Details -

• Title: The Notebook
• Author: Nicholas Sparks
• Publication Date: January 5, 2000
• Genre: Romance
• # of Pages: 206 (Kindle edition)
• Setting: 1946 & present-day-ish New Berne, North Carolina

Synopsis -

The story begins with an elderly man in a nursing home. He finds his way to a woman's room who has Alzheimer's. Throughout the day, he reads to her from a notebook about the love between Noah and Allie. They fall in love as teenagers, are separated, and think each has forgotten the other. Through this story, we learn of their timeless love. Later on, we learn more about the elderly gentleman and lady that we meet at the beginning of the story. We reminisce with him through his life's memories. This couple shows the reader the possibilities that an enduring and passionate love can have on a life.

Romance Characteristics -

• Contains the tone and mood of a romance in that it focuses on emotions, feelings, and thoughts of the characters.
• The characters exhibit qualities of easily identifiable types: Noah is strong and rugged while Allie is beautiful, strong, and bright.
• The story contains both outside circumstances that force them to part (Allie is forced to move with her parents at the end of the summer) and a misunderstanding between protagonists (Allie never receives the letters that Noah sends).
• The language is that of a typical romance novel. There is a lot of poetry and descriptive language.
• The focus is on the characters and their emotions rather than the plot.
• The focus is on the romantic relationship.
• Fast-paced in that it was an easy book to read through quickly.
• Results in a "happy" ending; Allie remembers Noah on their anniversary night. They spend that night together like they used to be.

Read-a-Likes -

*Disclaimer* Since I do not have much experience with this genre, these read-a-likes were gathered through reader's advisory resources.

• A Walk to Remember by Nicholas Sparks
• The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger
• The Art of Hearing Heartbeats by Jan-Philipp Sendker
• Me Before You by JoJo Moyes

Awards or Lists -

While this book has not won any awards (to my knowledge), it was turned into a major motion pictures. The movie was nominated for and won many different awards.

My Thoughts -

I have mixed feelings about this one. The initial portion of the book that goes through Allie and Noah's past was not for me. I found it all too neat and cliche. There was some eye-rolling involved. I had a hard time relating to it. It was all love and understanding. Where was the anger? Where was the frustration? Why was everyone so understanding? No one would be that understanding in real life. The second half of the book, however, got to me a bit more. The second portion was told from Noah's point of view in the present day. He thought back through memories with his children and with Allie. He reread letters that they had written to each other. He dealt with the difficult feelings that come with a loved one with Alzheimer's. This I found much more touching. To imagine the pain that someone must go through in that situation was heartbreaking. Overall, I thought it too idealistic. I am not a big romantic, though. I don't believe in love at first sight; I believe that love takes work and sweat. This book made love sound like something that easily and naturally came to two people. I know Nicholas Sparks is a popular author, but I don't think he is the author for me or that romance is the genre for me.