Novel•Romance•Love Story•Drama
The Notebook
Nicholas Sparks(1996)
4.6
Pages: 214
Language: English
ISBN: 978-0-446-60523-4
Description
The Notebook is a 1996 romantic novel by American novelist Nicholas Sparks. The novel was later adapted into a popular film of the same name in 2004. The story follows the relationship between Noah Calhoun and Allie Nelson, told through the perspective of an elderly man reading from a notebook to a ...
Awards
- New York Times Bestseller
- Adapted into Academy Award-nominated film (2004)
Excerpt
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📖 This is a preview excerpt. The full content (214 pages) is available below.
Who am I? And how, I wonder, will this story end?
The sun has come up and I am sitting by a window that is foggy with the breath of a life gone by. I'm a sight this morning: two shirts, heavy pants, a scarf wrapped twice around my neck and tucked into a thick sweater knitted by my daughter thirty birthdays ago.
My room is on the second floor of the nursing home, and though it is clean and comfortable, it is not home. The walls are white and bare except for a painting of flowers that hangs directly across from me. It is a simple watercolor, nothing special, but it reminds me of her. Always her.
There are other things in the room. A bed, a nightstand, a chest of drawers, a small table where I eat my meals. And books. Hundreds of books, stacked in piles on the floor, on the windowsill, on every surface. They are my companions now, these books, and though I've read most of them a dozen times, they still bring me comfort.
But today is different. Today I will read from the notebook.
Reviews
Publishers Weekly
4.5
A deeply moving love story that explores the enduring power of true love.
Library Journal
4.7
Sparks has crafted a beautiful tale of love, loss, and the triumph of the human spirit.
Booklist
4.8
An unforgettable story that will touch readers' hearts and remind them of the power of lasting love.
The Notebook
از Nicholas Sparks • بیان کردہ Professional Narrator
Chapter 1 - Miracles
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The Notebook
Nicholas Sparks
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Chapter 1 - Miracles
Who am I? And how, I wonder, will this story end?
The sun has come up and I am sitting by a window that is foggy with the breath of a life gone by. I'm a sight this morning: two shirts, heavy pants, a scarf wrapped twice around my neck and tucked into a thick sweater knitted by my daughter thirty birthdays ago. The thermostat in my room is set as high as it will go, and a smaller space heater sits directly behind me. It clicks and groans and spits out dry air that smells like singed hair, but at least it's warm.
My room is on the second floor of the nursing home, and though it is clean and comfortable, it is not home. The walls are white and bare except for a painting of flowers that hangs directly across from me. It is a simple watercolor, nothing special, but it reminds me of her. Always her.
There are other things in the room. A bed, a nightstand, a chest of drawers, a small table where I eat my meals. And books. Hundreds of books, stacked in piles on the floor, on the windowsill, on every surface. They are my companions now, these books, and though I've read most of them a dozen times, they still bring me comfort.
But today is different. Today I will read from the notebook.
Chapter 2 - The Story Begins
New Bern, North Carolina, 1946
The story I'm about to read to you happened a long time ago. I was seventeen, and she was sixteen. We were young and in love, and we thought we had all the time in the world.
Her name was Allie, and she was the most beautiful girl I had ever seen. She had long blonde hair that caught the sunlight like spun gold, and eyes the color of the ocean on a clear summer day. When she smiled, which was often, her whole face would light up, and I would forget everything else in the world.
I was working at the lumber mill that summer, saving money for college, when I first saw her at the carnival. She was with her friend Sarah, and they were laughing at something one of the carnival workers had said. I couldn't take my eyes off her.
"You're staring," my friend Fin said, nudging me with his elbow.
"I can't help it," I replied. "She's beautiful."
"Then go talk to her."
"I can't. Look at her. She's way out of my league."
But Fin was already walking toward them, and before I knew it, he was introducing me to Allie Hamilton. She smiled when she shook my hand, and I felt like I might faint.
"Nice to meet you, Noah," she said, and her voice was like music.
"Nice to meet you too," I managed to say, though my voice cracked like a thirteen-year-old's.
We spent the rest of the evening together, riding the Ferris wheel, playing games, eating cotton candy. She was funny and smart and kind, and by the end of the night, I was completely smitten.
"Can I see you again?" I asked as we walked toward her parents' car.
She looked at me for a long moment, and I held my breath.
"I'd like that," she said finally, and my heart soared.
Chapter 3 - Summer Love
That summer was the best of my life. Allie and I were inseparable. We would meet every day after I finished work, and we would walk along the river, talking about everything and nothing. She told me about her dreams of becoming an artist, and I told her about my plans to travel the world.
"I want to paint the sunrise over the mountains," she said one evening as we sat on the dock, our feet dangling in the water.
"Then you should," I said. "You should paint everything you want to paint."
"What about you? What do you want to do?"
"I want to build things," I said. "Houses, bridges, maybe even a castle for you."
She laughed. "A castle? That's very romantic, Noah Calhoun."
"I'm a romantic kind of guy," I said, and she kissed me then, soft and sweet under the stars.
We made love for the first time in the old house on the river, the one that would later become so important to our story. It was gentle and beautiful and perfect, and afterward, we lay in each other's arms and talked about the future.
"Promise me something," she said.
"Anything."
"Promise me that no matter what happens, you'll never forget this summer."
"I promise," I said, and I meant it with every fiber of my being.
Chapter 4 - The End of Summer
But summer couldn't last forever. Allie's parents had never approved of our relationship. They thought I wasn't good enough for their daughter, that I came from the wrong side of the tracks. They had plans for her, plans that didn't include a poor boy from New Bern.
"We're leaving tomorrow," she told me one evening in late August, tears streaming down her face.
"What do you mean, leaving?"
"My parents are taking me back to Charleston. They've enrolled me in Sarah Lawrence College."
"But what about us?"
"I don't know," she whispered. "I don't know."
We spent our last night together on the dock, holding each other and crying. We promised to write, to call, to find a way to be together. But deep down, I think we both knew it was the end.
"I love you, Noah," she said as the sun began to rise.
"I love you too, Allie. Always."
And then she was gone.
Chapter 5 - Letters Never Sent
I wrote to her every day for a year. Three hundred and sixty-five letters, each one telling her how much I missed her, how much I loved her, how I was working to make something of myself so that maybe, someday, I could be worthy of her.
But she never wrote back.
What I didn't know then was that her mother was intercepting my letters. She never saw a single one. Years later, when we found each other again, she would tell me that she thought I had forgotten her, that I had moved on with my life.
But I never forgot. Not for a single day.
Chapter 6 - The House
After the war, I came back to New Bern and bought the old house on the river. The one where we had made love, where we had talked about our dreams. It was falling apart, but I didn't care. I spent two years restoring it, making it beautiful again.
I painted it white with blue shutters, just like she had said she wanted. I planted a garden full of her favorite flowers. I built a dock where we could sit and watch the sunset. I did it all for her, even though I didn't know if I would ever see her again.
"Why are you doing this?" my father asked me one day as I worked on the porch.
"Because I love her," I said simply.
"Son, she's been gone for seven years. She's probably married by now."
"Maybe," I said. "But I still love her."
And I did. I loved her with every breath, every heartbeat, every moment of every day.
Chapter 7 - The Return
And then, one day, she came back.
I was working in the garden when I heard a car pull up. I looked up to see a woman getting out of a fancy car, and my heart stopped. It was her. Older, more beautiful than ever, but unmistakably her.
"Hello, Noah," she said, and her voice was exactly as I remembered.
"Allie," I breathed. "You came back."
"I saw the house in the newspaper," she said. "The article about you restoring it. I had to see it for myself."
We stood there for a moment, just looking at each other, and then she was in my arms, and it was like no time had passed at all.
"I missed you," she whispered against my chest.
"I missed you too," I said. "Every day."
Chapter 8 - The Choice
She stayed for a week. We talked and laughed and remembered. We made love again in the house I had built for her, and it was even more beautiful than before.
But she was engaged to another man. A good man, she said, a man her parents approved of. A man who could give her the life she was supposed to have.
"I have to choose," she said on her last night.
"Then choose me," I said. "Choose us."
"It's not that simple, Noah."
"Yes, it is. Do you love him?"
She was quiet for a long time. "I care about him," she said finally.
"But do you love him the way you love me?"
"No," she whispered. "No, I don't."
"Then stay. Stay with me, and we'll figure out the rest."
And she did. She chose love over duty, passion over security, me over the life her parents had planned for her.
Chapter 9 - Forever
We were married six months later in a small ceremony by the river. Her parents didn't come, but it didn't matter. We had each other, and that was enough.
We lived in the white house with blue shutters for forty-seven years. We raised four children there, watched them grow up and have children of their own. We grew old together, and every day was a gift.
But now she's sick. Alzheimer's, the doctors say. Some days she remembers me, and some days she doesn't. But I read to her anyway, from the notebook where I wrote down our story. Because even if she doesn't remember, I do. And love, real love, never dies.
"Who are you?" she asks me now, looking up from her wheelchair.
"I'm Noah," I say gently. "And you're Allie. And this is our story."
Sometimes she smiles and remembers. Sometimes she doesn't. But I keep reading, keep hoping, keep loving. Because that's what you do when you find your soulmate. You never give up.
And maybe, just maybe, love really can work miracles.
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A Walk to Remember
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