The Notebook

The Notebook is a 1996 romantic novel by American novelist Nicholas Sparks, a modern-day Oscar Wilde, and master of tragic love stories. It is a story of losing love, finding it back again for a brief moment, and eventually losing it again forever. The Notebook was Nicholas Sparks first published novel and was written over six months in 1994. Right after its release, The Notebook was listed on The New York Times Best Seller list and had been a hardcover best seller for more than a year.

The strength of the story lies in its memorable characters that will stay with you long after you are done reading the novel. The Notebook is a love story of Noah, 24, who returns from World War II to his town of New Bern, North Carolina where he restores an antebellum-style house after his father's death, and Allie, 24, sees the house in the newspaper and decides to pay him a visit.

Noah and Allie fell in love 7 years earlier but were separated by class, as she was the daughter of a wealthy family, and he worked as a laborer in a lumber yard. Seeing each other brings on a flood of memories and strong emotions in both of them. They hung out, talked to each other about things they've been holding on to for these 7 years, and found out how important they were to each other, and how their feelings have not changed. However, Allie has a fiance now, Lon. She knows she loves Noah, but she does not want to hurt Lon. Noah begs her to stay with him, but she decides to leave.

But at the very end of their life, they got to be together again, even though they both had to suffer from illnesses, Alzheimer's disease for Allie, and heart disease, kidney failure for Noah. The story ends with Noah going and finding Allie in bed in her room, asleep. She wakes up, recognizes him as Noah, and tells him that she loves him. They kiss and fall asleep next to each other, believing their love will take them away together.