Monthly Review: Dear John

2. Savannah and John meet when John is on a furlough from the military and they fall deeply in love after only a few days. Is their love believable? Do you think it is possible to have such an intense connection with someone you’ve only just met?
6. When John goes back to Germany after his furlough, he and Savannah vow to stay in touch and to marry when he returns. Do you think it’s possible to stay in love with someone without seeing them for months or years at a time? How does being apart affect Savannah and John’s relationship?
8. Do you think Savannah should have waited for John to come home or do you think it was understandable that she moved on with her life?

The novel Dear John tells the story about a rebellious soldier name John Tyree who meets the girl of his dreams, Savannah Lynn Curtis. The author, Nicholas Sparks, wrote this book in the perspective of John. Savannah waits for John to finish his task in the army so they can get married. Their only contact to each other was by mail. When the 9/11 attack happened, John stays in the army longer. Savannah couldn’t wait any longer and falls in love with someone else and wrote a heartbreaking letter to John calling it off. Years later, John came back home, getting use to the fact that Savannah is with someone else and faces the hardest decision of his life.
What most people think or do is that they get to know a person very well and go out for a bit and have loving and caring affections towards each other but, you can fall from in love to in lust.

If you keep believing in something and work towards to making it happen, it will happen. If you’re in a long distance relationship and you know in your heart that they are worth it. Time and strength is going to be your biggest test. When you pass that test, you’ll be one of the happiest and luckiest people in the world, because you know how strong your relationship is going to be. Distance really does stretch a person’s willpower just to pursue that one thing, but when you get it, how good does it feel to finally have it and know that it’s yours to keep? Even though a relationship is a relationship. Long distance relationships aren’t in their own group. It’s just like any other relationship, but the two just happen to be far away from each other. Savannah couldn’t wait anymore. Her love strength has gotten weak. Her personality practically changed after college. John and Savannah’s relationship failed the test.

Then again, from my experience, I definitely believe it is possible to have such an intense connection with someone you’ve only just met. I met my boyfriend of 9 months, Leon Ly, through my friend Christine (no it was not a hook up) and we made our long distance relationship work. How often you see each other shouldn’t determine how good you are at a relationship. Love should know no bounds, and if you wanted to get yourself into a long distance relationship or one with an age gap, then I think you should just do it. But if you don’t make it work, it obviously won’t. I don’t get see my boyfriend all that often, especially since I have to keep our relations out of my parents’ reach, (but not for long!) but we have something called a cellular phone, where we talk and text each other 24/7 and only see each other only during breaks and vacations. We excel in this relationship because we want it to work, and we’re able to make it work, despite the many miles between us.

John and Savannah‘s love was believable, and it still is; they didn’t have all that much time to actually get to know each other that well. John got to go out with Savannah for at least a month, because he has to go back to Germany. The long distance affects Savannah and John’s relationship because they were growing apart from each other. They didn’t even have a life together.

I think Savannah should’ve waited for John to come home. But I understand that Savannah has to go through all those times being lonely and not having anyone to hold or embrace her and feel loved, but she isn’t the only one who is going through a long distance relationship. It’s like as if she doesn’t understand how soldiers are being in the army. He is under so much pressure, and then writing a break up letter would make things better? Well, I guess she knows he’s not going to feel any better but John couldn’t even talk to Savannah about it and say how he feels about it because he could’ve persuaded her or have her think twice about the decision she was about to make. Sure, Tim was there to comfort her all those times when John was in the army, but that doesn’t mean she can just fall right in love with him and then write a letter dumping him. I just think she should’ve waited for John. She said so herself in her first letter to John that she was going to marry him when he came back for good.

“I love you John Tyree, and I’m going to hold you to the promise you once made me. If you come back, I’ll marry you. If you break you promise, you’ll break my heart.” P.139
Well, look who’s the heart breaker now? Savannah is lucky that John still loves her no matter what and that he doesn’t regret loving her. And Savannah still loves John of course; whenever there’s a full moon out at night, she goes outside and stare right into it, thinking about John, which shows her love for him is endless.

There are so many symbols in this novel that made the whole story board sweet and sour. You may not really notice it at first, but when you really think about it, like how I did, everything makes sense. Savannah’s cocky personality, thinking she knows everything, Tim and his little brother Alan who has autism, 9/11 attack, John’s father’s coin collection, John’s father and son bonding relationship with his father, and there are probably more symbols from the book. I mean, I think the “fall” of John and Savannah’s relationship started going down is when Nicholas Sparks added the 9/11 incident, which made John re-enlist. Which extended John and Savannah’s hope of being with each other was extended. The two lovers are separated because one of them got married and John found out what love actually means - “that love meant that you care for another person’s happiness more than your own, no matter how painful the choices you face might be.” P. 275
“Our love has three parts: a beginning, a middle, and an end. And although this is the way all stories unfold, I still can’t believe that ours didn’t go on forever.” P. 4 Well you can’t have everything. That’s all I have to say.

Dear John is easy to read. I think a nice place to read this book is at a beach. Maybe because it’s relaxing. It’s a wonderful and touching book to read, especially how Nicholas Sparks wrote it. I would recommend this book to anyone.