Tome Thursday: The Choice

Hello everyone!

I'm back with some more Nicholas Sparks fodder!

Because, you know, after I've read a million or so happily ever after books, or even those with a semi-happily ever after, I tend to get a bit weird and I pick up the old faithful again.

Which, in this case, means Mr. Sparks.

Let's be honest with ourselves, you don't reach for a Nicholas Sparks book because you want to read about true love or sexy beach encounters or even a romance in the stars.

You turn to this particular author when you're suffering from some form of chronic happiness and yo therefore need his stories to a) remind you that love hurts; b) to make sure your heart is never whole again for a period of time; and c) to ensure that you always come back for more, because, really, he's just that good.

Yeah, I'm waxing poetry, and I actually do like the guy. He writes incredibly realistic stories and is an amazing narrator, which only serves to keep me hooked. 

Regardless of the heartache.

So for this round, my choice was ... well, The Choice!

And I'll be honest when I say that I would have probably delayed reading it if not for the fact that the movie adaptation of the book premiered this month and I want to be faithful to my mantra about reading books before seeing movies, so I hunkered down and decided to chew through this.

Oh yes, I knew I was going to do some gnawing over here. I always do.

The story opens with our main male character, Travis, picking up flowers and driving to the hospital to apologize to his wife, but we don't actually know what's happened that he has to apologize for. It could be any number of things, and really, at that point it's unimportant: what's important is that it opens up the next chapters, which are basically Travis reminiscing about the life he's had with his wife so far.

At that point we sort of start switching point of views, as they jump between Travis, and the main female protagonist, Gabby.

Gabby is a pediatrician's assistant and she moved to the small town of Beaufort to be closer to her boyfriend of a number of years, Kevin, and to practice the profession she's chosen. She bought herself a house and a dog, a Collie named Molly, and that's actually how she meets Travis, since she storms over to his place - they're neighbours - and accuses his boxer, Moby, of impregnating her dog. Travis later explains that Moby's been neutered, and checks Molly out since he's the local vet - convenient - and well, Gabby's mortified. But he's a generally easy-going character and he keeps inviting her to paricipate in neighbourly activities over the weekend and such; she goes parasailing with him and his friends, meets his sister Stephanie (who I adored, she was so straightforward and to the point), sits out on deck with him, etc.

And they kiss.

And have dinner together.

And he helps Molly with her puppies and some problems later.

And they sleep together.

And yeah.

Gabby must then decide between Travis and Kevin, and we flashforward to the present again.

Obviously, she chose Travis, and they go married; at this point they have two daughters together, they've built a house on a plot of land Travis bought a long time ago, they made a home together.

And still, we don't know why he's apologizing for, although now we learn he's carrying a document with him that a lawyer drafted.

Oh no.

Divorce, you're thinking? Maybe he cheated on her? Maybe the marriage fizzled out?

Only, we have another memory to go through.

Travis and Gabby were in a car accident a couple of months earlier; he's woken up from the coma, but she hasn't.

Cue pindrop.

Of course this isn't the end, either; as Gabby has now been in a coma for three months, Travis needs to make a decision, whether to move her to a nursing home OR - according to her own wish, after learning about a similar situation with a couple which then deteriorated completely after the wife didn't wake up - to turn the machines that keep her alive off, and let her die.

The last thirty or so pages of the book had me biting my nails, bad; but in the end, Travis couldn't go through with Gabby's wish, and moved her to a nursing home.

And then the scene shifts again, to him sitting on deck watching his daughters swing on a tire, and he remembers something else ... a call he got from the nursing home that his wife was awake.

Yes, at the end of the book, Gabby's back with her family again, and slowly getting better, and life continues for them all, happily.

My heart literally stopped for a moment after that sentence 'She's awake', because I realized then what the book was actually all about; I first thought it was a choice between Travis and Kevin, and then a choice between living it safe or taking a risk, then a silly choice about not taking an umbrella, or the choice of divorce, yes or not ... but then when I read about Gabby's wish, and the choice Travis had to make, coupled with the fact that she WOKE UP LATER ...

If he had pulled the plug, he would have killed her. The end. No going back from there.

Yeah, I sniffled over this one. I'm not going to lie.

I have a feeling the movie's going to be heartbreaking, too.

xx

*image not mine