How Far Would You Go For Love?

In my experience, you either love or hate Nicholas Sparks. Even if you hate him, it is a loving hate because he writes such powerful and emotional love stories. In his book, The Choice I have a loving hate for him this time around mainly because for the first time while reading one of his books, I have someone in my life who I think about when reading.

The Choice tells the story of Travis, a veterinarian in South Carolina and Gabby, a physician’s assistant at a small practice in the same town. The novel starts with the present Travis reminiscing about how he met Gabby and fell in love. Only later when the novel comes back to the present does the reader fully understand the meaning of love and what Travis was thinking when he thought of the past.

The book kept me thinking the whole time. I found myself having to reread passages to see if my hunches were correct. As Sparks moved from the present to the past back to the present, he wove a story about love that transcends time – at least for this couple. He wasn’t afraid to go after the nitty gritty of relationships – the betrayals, the back talk, the negativity, the annoyance. All of those things are part of a healthy, working relationship and marriage. No one said it would be easy; they just said it would be worth it.

That is the lesson taken from this book. Love is hard work. You have to be a strong person to be willing to take it on. But in the end, through all of the trials and tribulations there is a beautiful light that shines over everything in its path and that moment makes everything worth it. Sparks stays true to what he knows best – love, compassion and romance. Some critics say that because all of his books have those themes in them, they are not original and are dull after reading 2 or 3. I say they are wrong. Love, compassion and romance might be apparent in all of his novels but with an infinite number of stories to be told about love, compassion and romance his novels will be anything but dull. As long as there is love in the world, Sparks will keep writing and evoking those emotions by his readers.

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