Review: The Notebook by Nicholas Sparks

Some love stories just never die. They are just passed on from one generation to the other. Sometimes in the form of bits and pieces and sometimes as a whole. It entirely depends upon a person how he/she remembers it. Novelists over the time have gone greater lengths to explore the feeling called love. It's been a subject of every second book since the time writing evolved on planet earth. Author Nicholas Sparks in an attempt to enthrall the readers has written "The Notebook" which tries to capture the essence of unconditional love between two people. So has he succeeded in getting the right mix or it's a plain blatant story? Let's find out. 

The Notebook opens in a hospital. An old man is siting at the bedside of a sick woman. He is reading from a faded old notebook. He narrates a story of love, a story that happened many years before. It tells the story of Noah Calhoun and Allie Nelson.
The story is set in the coast of North Carolina in the 1940s. Noah, a 31-year-old, has returned to his hometown, New Bern, and is now restoring a large plantation house, the kind of house he had long dreamed of. A huge inheritance has now enabled him to realize this dream.
But Noah has another dream, a haunting memory of a beautiful young girl he met 14 years ago when they were teenagers and the one magical summer they spent together. They were unable to take their relationship any further because of the class distinction that still ruled the South. Allie belonged to a wealthy family, and Noah was just a farm laborer back then. But he still lives with the cherished memories of their short romance, and Noah is almost sure that he will never see her again.
However, she enters his life again. Allie is now a 29-year-old socialite, engaged to be married to a very wealthy man, Lon Hammond. She sees a newspaper article about the house restoration and decided to pay him a visit.
When they meet, they realize that they still love each other. Now, Allie has to choose between her love for Noah and loyalty to Lon - who she does not want to hurt.
At this stage, the old man reveals his relationship with the woman in the bed, who suffers from Alzheimer's disease. The love story resumes after this. The man then continues reading from the notebook.
The Notebook is a poignant tale of love and its power to overcome the various hassles, including the distance between two individuals and unexpected incidents and tragedies that occur across time.

First look at the cover and the title with a unique tagline and the readers can feel an intense passion for the book straight away. The latest edition carries the tag that it has been converted into a major motion movie. There is no way to put it down once you have read the blurb. The first few lines are enough to mesmerize a reader and compel the person into reading this novel. The first impressions are very positive indeed. 

The story starts off from a hospital where an old man is sitting besides a sick woman and is reading excerpts from a faded old notebook He is narrating an old love story which happened years before and how the two lovers managed to overcome distances, boundaries and other problems in order to be together again till eternity. It's the story of unconditional and untold love between Noah & Allie who are drifted apart by fate and years later by fate come together again to rekindle their romance and take their unfinished journey forward. 

The story is enchanting. The way it opens and then goes back into time and the simple conversations which happen between the the handsome Noah & charming Allie are reminders to all the lovers that this is the story we are talking about. If you have to love somebody this is the way it has to be done or else it's not love. It's pure, divine, unconditional, untold. It's about silent promises and those small little things that keep going the spark between two people. Every word in the story is sweet like honey and every passion and expression is like a stage where few artists are getting ready to enthrall the audiences. The unexpected end and the old man narration through Noah's journey is icing on the cake. 

Flaws are hard to find as there are not any. It's difficult or rather it's impossible to pick out any dull parts in the book. You won't find any. And if you still do then I guess you haven't experienced love the way it has been portrayed in the book. 

It's a book for all irrespective of the age group. It has a strong message for everyone that if you love somebody no matter what the odds, try to see it to the end as not only it'll make your love divine but mark you as the greatest lovers of all time. It's a love story of a lifetime. No amount of praise can do any justification to the book. If you want to experience it, if you want to experience true love just go and pick it up and read it as all the answers to your questions lie in the book. 

RATINGS: 

5 OUT OF 5. 

P.S: I would like to thank Mehek Bassi author of the book "Chained" for inspiring me to take a de-tour from my other to be read books and read this book on a priority basis. It's her strong recommendation and confidence that inspired me to read this enchanting love story and pen down this review. Thank you Mehek.