Julie's Review: The Lucky One

Summary: After U.S. Marine Logan Thibault finds a photograph of a smiling young woman buried in the dirt during his tour of duty in Iraq, he experiences a sudden streak of luck -- winning poker games and even surviving deadly combat. Only his best friend, Victor, seems to have an explanation for his good fortune: the photograph -- his lucky charm. Back home in Colorado, Thibault can't seem to get the woman in the photograph out of his mind and he sets out on a journey across the country to find her. But Thibault is caught off guard by the strong attraction he feels for the woman he encounters in North Carolina - Elizabeth, a divorced mother -- and he keeps the story of the photo, and his luck, a secret. As he and Elizabeth embark upon a passionate love affair, his secret soon threatens to tear them apart -- destroying not only their love, but also their lives. Filled with tender romance and terrific suspense, THE LUCKY ONE is an unforgettable story about the surprising paths our lives often take and the power of fate to guide us to true and everlasting love. ~amazon.com

Review: I have never read a Nicholas Sparks book before now. My sister is a huge fan, but I've never been inclined. I will say that Mr. Sparks is a gifted story teller, even if I'm way past believing in soul mates and fairy tale romance. The Lucky One is an interesting love story that is told through varying points of view but I always felt like an outsider looking in. Maybe that's good, maybe that's bad; I'm not truly sure.

We are quickly introduced to Keith Clayton and Logan Thibault, just Thibault is what he goes by, and you kind of figure out that this will not be their only encounter, but I didn't see the link until it was almost right up on me. As big of a jerk as Keith is, Logan is the opposite. We know off the bat that he's going to be a good guy, just by his actions and how he handles situations.

Throughout the novel we learn that Thibault isn't really all that complicated. He was inspired to find the girl in the picture by his best friend Victor. What I did like is that Sparks' slowly revealed Thibault's time in Iraq to us either via flashback or what he eventually reveals to Elizabeth.

I liked Elizabeth but I didn't connect with her. She was too perfect. Her only fault was to have gotten married young to a loser, other than that she had no faults. Her son, Ben is a good kid but like most 10 year olds, he has issues that he reveals to Thibault. None of his issues were severe and nothing that he couldn't handle himself.

Of course, as a reader you know the secret of the picture is going to come back to slap Thibault in the face. Once it happened, I was happy it was over and out in the open.

Was it a quick read? Yes. Was is thought provoking? Not really but I did like the parts about his time as a soldier. And how each soldier is affected differently. Will I read another Nicholas Sparks? Perhaps; but I won't be rushing to buy anything that he wrote. His novels are just not my type of novels anymore.

If you are looking for a good fairy-tale then The Lucky One is for you.

Final Take: 3.5/5

Movie Review: Nights in Rodanthe

Summary: Sparks (A Bend in the Road, etc.) logs more miles on the winding high road of romance with the story of two middle-aged people who meet by chance in the small North Carolina coastal town of Rodanthe. The impassioned but doomed romance seems to owe much to Robert James Waller's The Bridges of Madison County. Once again, a housewife who has focused on everyone but herself indulges in a brief, intense, secret affair with a stranger who changes her life forever. As the story begins, Adrienne Willis is 60, the divorced mother of three grown children. To help her troubled daughter cope with the untimely recent death of her husband, Adrienne tells her the tale of her love affair, which took place 15 years before. At the time, Adrienne was an uptight matron whose ex-husband had just left her for a younger woman. This rejection colors her entire life, and Sparks realistically portrays a vulnerable and isolated woman who throws herself into raising her children to escape her despair. Paul Flanner, her paramour, is a surgeon and an obsessive workaholic with no genuine connection to his wife or son, whose world completely falls apart when one of his patients inexplicably dies. ~ book summary on amazon.com

Review: I will start by saying that I did not read the book Nights in Rodanthe but I didn't read The Notebook or A Walk to Remember and I loved those movies. I honestly can't say that Nights in Rodanthe will be held in the same esteem. I enjoy both Richard Gere and Diane Lane and thought they were believable in their roles as Paul and Adrienne, but the story was so incredibly forced. I mean you knew what was coming a mile away and yet I somehow had to watch the entire movie. I guess I stayed tuned in to see if I would be shocked by some twist I didn't see coming. There wasn't.

My sister did read the book and loved it. It was her first foray into Nicholas Sparks and she's pretty much read all of his books. I think she might be disappointed in this adaptation, so I told her to skip it. I can tell that even from the book summary that it was changed. I mean unless I really missed something, it wasn't told as an older woman looking back, it was in the here and now. I think it might have come off better if it was told in past tense.

I always enjoy seeing Chris Meloni outside of Law & Order:SVU, but why does he always play the jerk and/or the jerk ex-husband? Just curious. The scenery was beautiful and I wonder if that really is an inn in North Carolina or if that was a set? Probably something I'll never know.

So if you are in the mood for a good romantic film, skip Nights in Rodanthe and watch A Walk to Remember or The Notebook instead.

Final Take: 2/5