Dear John by Nicholas Sparks

I used to be a huge Nicholas Sparks fan. He wrote about the "movie love" that I love and he is from NC so most of his stories are set in familiar places. I cried my eyes out reading The Notebook and to this day that book and movie are still on my all-time favorites list. I loved Message in a Bottle and A Walk to Remember too. But slowly his books became too predictable for even me.

But since I now have to watch commercials due to not having DVR, I kept seeing the commercial for the movie Dear John. What can I say? I am a HUGE sucker for movie love and Channing Tatum is HOT and the actress that plays the female lead is on one of my favorite shows- Big Love. But since the book is always better than the movie, I had to read the book first.

I still heart Nicholas Sparks. I flew through this book in 3 days. I was reading it in my car at stoplights. It's just such an easy romantic read that sucks you in.

The main character Savannah is from Lenior, NC which is literally 15-20 minutes from my hometown of Morganton. So needless to say I could relate to her. The boy John is from Wilmington which I have been to many times. Savannah goes to UNC which is right up the road from where I am now. So really the whole story felt like it could be written by people I actually might know.

Savannah meets John while he is on leave from his army base in Germany. She is staying with a group of students from UNC who are there for a month to build some houses for Habitat for Humanity. He is there for 2 weeks visiting his dad. Their paths cross and immediately they are smitten with each other. By the time John's leave is up, they are full blown head-over-heels in love.

The rest of the story is about how they try to keep their relationship and love going through letters and short phone conversations and visits. You'll have to read it to find out the rest, but I will tell you it made me think about what true love really looks like and acts like.

It doesn't have that happily ever after ending I love, but it doesn't have that tragic someone dies ending either. At first I hated the ending because it didn't wrap up everything in a nice little happy bow, but I appreciate it and what the author is trying to get across.

It's a story about soul mates and love- in many different forms.

I give it 4.5 out of 5 stars.

I still haven't seen the movie, but I heard they totally changed the setting and the ending.

Also last summer I listened to Nicholas Sparks other book The Last Song on my way to the beach. It was pretty good and apparently it is going to be made in to a movie too!