Dear John

Book: Dear John
By: Nicholas Sparks 

Plot/Summary: Dear John is spoken from the view of John, a soldier who struggles to reconcile his troubled youth with his reformed self. He recounts his meeting of Savannah, a college student who is building homes for underprivileged families, when he finds her overthrown purse on a beach. They quickly fall in love and must deal with John's decision to reenlist after his term because of the September 11th attack, or a war that is similar, but isn't disclosed. Throughout the story, John and Savannah struggle to stay together and eventually Savannah must make a decision between John and her life at home.

Review: The character of Savannah annoyed me because she seemed too indecisive in what she really expected from John and didn't have a logical stance for why she left him and kept leading him on. The ending of Dear John also disappointed me because I'm a hopeless romantic, and I felt like John should have fought for Savannah more. John's character is interesting because he speaks in past tense of how his lost love and how his relationship. I liked the perspective and the nostalgia used in his view.

Author's Writing Technique:

Nicholas Sparks' novels are very popular romance novels that cannot necessarily be considered romance. His novels always have a moral dilemma and life changing decision that keeps the reader turning the page, hoping the protagonist gets a happy ending. The targeted reader would most likely be women, although many of his novels are from the male perspective.

What I love about his writing is that he doesn't use a specific age group as his main characters in every story, as other famous authors might. His writing perspective is versatile because he's not afraid to write from a male, female, young, middle aged perspective and is able to give the reader a lot more variety in terms of relationship ideals than a writer who only targets a certain age group.

Writer's Tip: Try using a basic plot and writing from the perspective of different characters in it to help write different perspectives in the same situation. 

His novels are great for teens, young adults, adults and any age that understands the fact that love and life isn't a perfected formula.