The Best of Me
By Nicholas Sparks
Hardcover, Large Print, 292 pages
Published on: October 11th
2011
Publisher: Grand Central
Publishing
ISBN: 1455504106
The new epic love story from the multi-million-copy
bestselling author of The Notebook and The Last Song. Nicholas
Sparks is one of the world's most beloved authors.
Nicholas Sparks! If I had to talk of the best romance writer of today, there’s no doubt that I’d say Nicholas Sparks.
I was longing to read
his latest book The Best of Me for such a long time and now I can
finally say that Sparks has done it once more.
The book starts with
the introduction of Dawson Cole, a low-caste man from the small town of
Oriental, and his hallucinations of a dark-haired man. Dawson had been in love
with Amanda for several years since they parted ways after high school
and has never dated another woman in all these years. Now, in their forties,
Amanda and Dawson are reunited for a weekend when they hear of the demise of
their mentor, Tuck, at Oriental. After spending some time together, they
realize that love was still in the air and was as strong in their hearts now as
it had been years ago when they would spend time together at Tuck’s garage.
When I started reading
the book, I could feel no emotions to connect with it but that was maybe due to
my state of mind back then. As I gradually got mentally stable, I began to feel
connected with the book. It seemed like a re-do of The Notebook in some ways, peppered with the feel of The Wedding by the same author.
And of course, the
typical things that Sparks does with his books cannot be forgotten. The never
dying love, its dormancy and then the surge again; and with the girl having
moved on and the man still stuck with her cannot be kept away. Reading so many
books by Nicholas Sparks makes this one slightly predictable.
The cover of the paperback,
with which it was launched in India as well, is deceptive! It is the beach and
the couple are so happy together and so close but when you open the book,
you’ll find Dawson hallucinating a dark-haired man. I don’t know about the
other people who read the book, but I found it pretty funny. The couple never
even went to a beach together in the book (except for the back stories) and for
God’s sake, they’re in their forties.
The love story of Tuck
and Clara in between was beautiful. Honestly, I liked them as much as I liked
Dawson and Amanda. But then, this was not the only sub-plot of the book. It had
many unconnected ones which irritated me so much that at some points I would
skip a few paragraphs as they dragged on unnecessarily. We had a dozen unnecessary
characters like Ted Cole and his wife, Abee Cole and his girlfriend, Dr. Bonner
and his wife and his children, Frank and Jared and Lynn And Bea and Annette,
some Roger and some Ron and this and that. At times, it seemed as if he’d just
done it to fill in the pages, though everything seemed connected.
The characters were a
mix of nice and irritating people. I liked Dawson but I didn’t like Amanda
much.
Sparks probably tried
to mix suspense with romance but couldn’t make it dominating enough.
I want to write about
the end of the book which was abrupt, but I don't want to ruin it for you. Let
me tell you, although most of it was predictable but a few things
don’t at all happen the way - or for that matter, most probably you - would
want to happen, thus giving it an abrupt climax. I am yet to decide
whether I liked or hated the end. I don’t think I hated it but I didn’t like it
either. It gives a queer feeling in my heart.
I’d recommend this one
to the romance readers and the Sparks fans only if they promise not to complain
after they read the ending.
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