A Bend in the Road by Nicholas Sparks

A Bend in the Road by Nicholas Sparks

Jessica Dulin

Opinion

One thing I loved about this book is that in some chapters, the book was told in the point-of-view of Missy’s killer, making the story more interesting. Another thing I liked about this book is that it is a great love story and I’m a sucker for romance. However, I didn’t like how the book ended so quickly. I wish that the author would have elaborated a little bit more at the end. I also didn’t like how the author made it seem as if Miles was so caught up in his wife’s death that he hardly ever was attentive to his son. I would classify this as a Romantic novel, because it is mostly about Miles and Sarah falling in love. I think this book was made for more mature audiences, so I believe that it should be for teenagers in high school and for adults.

Themes

One theme of this story is, the more you wait, the less you’ll succeed. This is the theme, because Brian takes years to confess about the murder. If Brian had called the police when he first ran over Missy, he wouldn’t have caused all the pain and suffering for Miles and Sarah.

Another theme of the story is that true love prevails. This is a theme because though Sarah’s brother killed Missy, Miles still loved Sarah. It took Miles a while to realize that he couldn’t let Sarah go, but he did love her.

The last theme is that life isn’t perfect. Miles has had a lot of stuff happen to him. First, his wife died and he couldn’t find out who killed her. Also, when he did find out who had killed her, it was Sarah’s brother. Life isn’t perfect.

Characters

The 2 major characters are Miles and Sarah. The minor character in this story is Jonah. Miles is a police officer. His wife died in a car accident and ever since then his life has been a train wreck. When he meets Sarah, however, his life takes a spin in a positive direction. Sarah is a girl who moved from a large city to a small town. She is a teacher and she loves doing her job. She was doing fine with all of her students except for one, Jonah. Jonah is Miles’ son and he has always been a good kid. The only problem is that his teachers would let him get by without doing work because his mom had died. That’s when Sarah decided that she would start helping him with all of his work so that he could caught up with the rest of his class.

Setting

The setting of the story is in 1988, 2 years after Miles' wife had died. The story is located in New Bern, North Carolina. The main characters are usually in Miles' or Sarah's house.The time is important, because it is 2 years after Missy’s death and Miles is finally starting to accept the fact that she is really dead. Miles has finally somewhat given up on finding Missy’s killer, but he has no idea what is yet to come. I imagine New Bern to be a very small town, where everybody knows everybody. I also think that it would be a little run-down, because the way the author described it, it sounds like a very old town

Summary

The story takes place in New Bern,North Carolina. Miles Ryan is a police officer whose wife was ran over by a car. It hit him and his son, Jonah pretty hard, Miles tried his best to figure out who had killed his wife. but he just couldn't figure out who had killed Missy Ryan.

He couldn't figure out who had killed Missy until Sarah Andrews became Jonah's new teacher. Sarah and Miles hit off very well and they started dating. Jonah loved Sarah and he had wanted Miles to date her. Miles and Sarah really liked each other and their relationship got very serious. They had a really great time with each other.

Things were going very well until Sarah found out that her brother, Brian was the one that had killed Miles' wife. Sarah and Brian told Miles and Miles got very angry. He didn't speak to Sarah for weeks;however, the book ends saying that on Christmas Eve, Sarah came home to find Jonah and Miles waiting for her in her apartment.

The Book

Title: A Bend in the Road

Author: Nicholas Sparks