The Last Song

Imagine that you’ve been shipped to live with your dad for the summer with only your little brother to keep you company. You haven’t spoken to your dad in three years, you’ve lived in the city your whole life and now you’re forced to spend the next three months in North Carolina with no friends to keep you company.

In Nicholas Sparks’ The Last Song, this is how Ronnie Miller, the rebellious city girl, has to spend her summer.

After her parents got a divorce, Ronnie blamed her dad and never spoke to him again. This summer is going to be different, since she has to spend it with him.

What makes it even more miserable is the fact that she’ll be sharing a room with her pesky brother, she’ll have to be an extra careful law-abiding citizen after she shoplifted in the city, and she knows her dad will try everything to get her to play piano again. Since the divorce, she started to act out and break curfews. She also grew to hate the piano, which was once a big part of her life.

As soon as she arrives at her father’s bungalow on the beach she escapes off on her own. Deciding that there’s nothing better to do in the town, she Ronnie makes her way over to the festival by the beach.

While trying to make the best of her summer, she ends up getting knocked down by a preppy-looking volleyball player. Not only does she spill her soda all over herself, but she is forced to buy a Finding Nemo shirt to wear to hide the stains.

Then she meets Blaze, a girl who is almost exactly like Ronnie. She thought she should’ve been really happy to find a new friend, but with Blaze came Marcus, her creepy, sinister boyfriend who finds himself falling all over Ronnie and won’t leave her alone.

Just as Ronnie thinks her up and down summer can’t get any worse, a mishap involving some stolen CDs puts Ronnie right back under the eyes of the court and into a miserable summer yet again. With one bad thing happening after another, Ronnie thinks about how bad her luck really is, and then she runs into Will, the preppy volleyball player.

Surprisingly, Will turns out to be a pretty nice guy, and Ronnie admits, a pretty handsome guy, too. And the more time they spend together, the more she notices how much she really likes him. . .

What she doesn’t know is the fact that when her and Will are alone together, they are never really alone.

The Last Song really gives its readers hope in second chances; second chances in love, family, and a second chance for a better life. This book proves that love of all kinds can be found in the most unlikely places and last forever. Nicholas Sparks has yet again created a wonderful masterpiece about the trials and tests of love. His new novel is quite an inspiration and an excellent read with a little rebellion thrown in along the way. A movie was also inspired by this book and is said to come out in theaters in spring 2010.