JESSICA ESTREMERA - Nicholas Sparks: A Biography

If the names Allie and Noah call to your mind two young sweethearts who in turn pull at your heartstrings, then chances are you are familiar with their creator, Nicholas Sparks. As one of the worlds preeminent storytellers, Nicholas Sparks has penned highly popular love stories for the contemporary reader. His works include novels turned motion pictures such as The Notebook, Message in a Bottle, A Walk to Remember, Dear John, Nights in Rodanthe, The Lucky One and The Last Song tallying seventeen published novels and seven movie adaptations.

In 2003 he co-wrote a moving memoir with his older brother Michael (Micah,) entitled Three Weeks With My Brother, chronicling their journey around the world while bonding over childhood memories of family tragedy and triumph. As the last remaining members of the family, the brothers bond while crossing international borders.

Sparks writings have spent a lot of quality time on the bestsellers list, garnering him the title of #1 New York Times bestselling author. With the translation of his novels into more than thirty languages, he has achieved international success. Speaking about his global adulation, Sparks says, I try hard. There have been a lot of movies and people are familiar with my work. It just goes to the fact that love is a universal emotion. Its experienced around the world and people relate to it and there are certain segments of the population, in every country of the world that want to read about it.

Sparks finds inspiration in his surroundings, often using names, places and familiar stories in the weaving of his classic tales of love. Sparks tales are faithfully set in a small town somewhere in North/South Carolina and feature a love lost/love found theme.

Admittedly, Sparks wants the reader to feel genuinely strong emotions when reading his work, as death and illness are usually incorporated in his stories. I write in a genre that was not defined by me. The examples were not set out by me. They were set 2,000 years ago by Aeschylus, Sophocles and Euripides. They were called the Greek tragedies. A thriller is supposed to thrill and a horror is supposed to scare you.

Screenwriting has also become a weapon in his arsenal. While Message in a Bottle was his first novel-based film, it was The Notebook that propagated his name amongst readers and moviegoers across the country and beyond. Big-name movie stars now jump at the chance to work with Sparks, whose movies have progressed the careers of Ryan Gosling and Rachel McAdams, and have also starred other A-list actors such as Kevin Costner and Paul Newman.

Recently Disney Pictures purchased The Last Song screenplay specifically for the then seventeen-year old starlet Miley Cyrus. Sparks completed the screenplay for the film before he had written a single word of the novel.

Finding success at the age of twenty-nine both humbles and surprises Sparks. He says of his fast track success, I never grew up thinking I was going to be a novelist. You hope for the success, you dream about it but you never expect it.

Born in Omaha, Nebraska to Jill Emma Marie, a homemaker, and Patrick Michael Sparks, a student/professor, young Nicholas spent the formative years of his life moving around the Midwest with his family. Patrick Sparks graduate studies kept the Sparks family traveling constantly , causing a strain on the parents marriage and leading to several brief separations for the pair. During these difficult times, Nicholas, his siblings, and his mother moved to Watertown, Minnesota, Los Angeles, and Grand Island Nebraskasometimes without Patrick Sparks.

By the time he was nine years old, Nicholas had moved three times. In 1974 they finally settled in Fair Oaks, California, and remained there throughout Nicholas high school years.

A decade later, after graduating valedictorian of his class, Nicholas enrolled in The University of Notre Dame. During the next school year, Jill Sparks announced that the family was moving back to California. Patrick had taken a teaching position at California State University at Sacramento and the couple had reconciled.

In Sparks memoir Three Weeks with My Brother, Sparks recollects how their mother ruled with an iron fist. And their father was not always so stricthe allowed them to watch horror movies, played his first guitar for them and would occasionally sing for them. During this time, their parents marriage was falling apart. While their father was finishing his dissertation, he was physically and emotionally absent.

Jill Sparks instilled in her children her religious beliefs and values. The family practiced Catholicism, never missing Sunday mass (but oftentimes running late because of younger sister Dana). While Jills religiosity gave her younger son a solid foundation of morals, Patricks love for and dedication to academics instilled in Nicholas the love of learning, reading, and knowledge.

Throughout the Sparks siblings childhoods, their parents (particularly their mother) constantly encouraged them to watch out for one another; Nicholas, Michael, and Dana thus prioritized each others well-being starting very early on in their young lives. For example, while growing up, both Nicholas and Michael served as watchdogs over their baby sister. The three of them formed a close-knit sibling circle that endured into their adult lives. It was Dana Sparks life and and her subsequent death at the age of thirty three which led to the inspiration for Nicholas renowned novel A Walk to Remember .

As adolescence arose, Nicholas and his brother struggled with their evolving relationship. Once an inseparable pair, Michael now deemed his younger brother Nicholas a nuisance and a tag along. It was during these years that Nicholas and Dana became each others closest friend. Even during Nicholass teenage years, his mother took on the role of family guide. For example, at this point in the childrens upbringing, Jill Sparks incorporated a daily evening ritual in which each child had to name three nice things that his or her sibling did for him or her that day.

As a teenager, Nicholas not only excelled in academics, but also began to experience the exhilaration of high school sports, where he thrived in running track and earned a full scholarship to the University of Notre Dame. At Notre Dame, Sparks became a star athlete in competitions. He still holds the record time in his teams track and field relay race set in 1985 as a freshman, and had aspirations of becoming an Olympic athlete. Sadly, after his freshman year, injury would get the best of his body and end his hopes of competing in the Olympic games.

It was at the end of his first semester that Sparks began to dabble in writing. Running was far and away the most important thing in my life, Sparks says. After being sidelined with an achilles tendon injury, Sparks went home and went crazy. I had all of this physical energy, he remembers. His mother suggested he stop pouting and do something. When he asked, What? she suggested he go write a book.

So began the book writing process for Sparks. I knew I loved books, so I decided to give it a try. To see if I could do it for real. An avid reader at a young age, Sparks recalls, reading reading reading. I took a class in college in American fiction since the 1950s and I thought this is great! Sparks first completed novel, The Passing , was written at age nineteen and was never published, nor was his subsequent novel The Royal Murders .

Life for Sparks took an unexpected twist in his last year of college. On his final Spring Break he met his future wife Catherine. A day after meeting he told her you and I are going to get married one day, a statement that proved to be correct. His post graduation future was up in the air at this point because he was not accepted to any law schools to which he applied. Working as an apprentice real-estate appraiser during the day and moonlighting as a waiter at night, Sparks saved enough for an engagement ring. Cathy agreed to marry him and his big brother Micah was the best man.