The Longest Ride by Nicholas Sparks

Ninety-one year old Ira Levinson is in trouble. Struggling to stay conscious after a car crash, with his mind fading, an image of his beloved, and long-dead, wife Ruth appears. Urging him to hang on, she lovingly recounts the joys and sorrows of their life together - how they met, the dark days of WWII, and its unrelenting effect on their families. A few miles away, college student Sophia Danko's life is about to change. Recovering from a break-up, she meets the young, rugged Luke and is thrown into a world far removed from her privileged school life. Sophia sees a new and tantalising future for herself, but Luke has a secret which threatens to break it all apart. Ira and Ruth. Sophia and Luke. Two couples, separated by years and experience, whose lives are about to converge in the most unexpected - and shocking - of ways.

I have been longing to try a book by Nicholas Sparks for some time now as there has been so much talk about his books and so I was eager to get my taster of his work. So for my first Nicholas Sparks book I have The Longest Ride which tells two stories that gradually come as one. Ninety-One year old Ira finds himself trapped in his car after a crash and as he battles to stay alive he visions his wife Ruth and this helps to keep him fighting.

Sophia has had a hard time recovering from her break up with ex Brian, it seems like where ever she goes he is always around, but life is about to go down a different path as she meets Luke , a bull rider but will the secret Luke hides from Sophia mean that what they have together could be in jeopardy?

The storyline is told by our three main characters points of views. I found the switch between each character was perfectly timed just as I was beginning to get comfortable with a character the storyline would then switch to a different character which kept my interest sparked. I warmed quite easily and quickly to all three of our characters and I felt as though they all brought their own little something to the storyline. I did find that during the middle of the book the story was pleasant enough but it was a little flat, I was still interested in what was going to happen but I think my expectations were high for this book because of the hype about the author.  To me the last third of this book is what really made this book because it was a lot more eventful and there were a lot of emotions towards the end and the pace seemed to pick up at the end.

What I loved about this book was I really couldn’t see how the two stories were going to meet, and this is what kept me intrigued. I also loved how the author manages to portray the strong love Ira has for his wife Ruth, it was very moving to read and it was clear that Ruth was his whole meaning to life. I loved that both Ira and Luke were both very gentlemanly characters and very loving and caring it isn’t often that we get two great men in a novel! Sophia was a great character too and I enjoyed watching her and Luke’s relationship blossom.

I am glad that I got to try a Nicholas Sparks book, it wasn’t what I was expecting at all but I still enjoyed it and I would read another of his books.

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