It is only fitting that our February read would be a Nicholas Spark novel, The Wish.
Synopsis:
1996 was the year that changed everything for Maggie Dawes. Sent away at sixteen to live with an aunt she barely knew in Ocracoke, a remote village on North Carolina’s Outer Banks, she could think only of the friends and family she left behind . . . until she met Bryce Trickett, one of the few teenagers on the island. Handsome, genuine, and newly admitted to West Point, Bryce showed her how much there was to love about the wind-swept beach town—and introduced her to photography, a passion that would define the rest of her life.
By 2019, Maggie is a renowned travel photographer. She splits her time between running a successful gallery in New York and photographing remote locations around the world. But this year she is unexpectedly grounded over Christmas, struggling to come to terms with a sobering medical diagnosis. Increasingly dependent on a young assistant, she finds herself becoming close to him.
As they count down the last days of the season together, she begins to tell him the story of another Christmas, decades earlier—and the love that set her on a course she never could have imagined.
Book Club Rates This Read:
3.5 out of 5 Stars
*The common review was that it was a typical Nicholas Sparks novel, so if that isn't your type of read, we don't suggest it.
Questions Discussed During Book Club:
Section 1
Tis the Season
Did you expect The Wish to start out the way it did? How did you feel for Maggie?
How did you feel about young Maggie’s revelation in 1995?
Would you have made the same decision Maggie’s parents made to send her to aunt Linda?
What impact do you think Mark will have on Maggie’s life and the gallery?
Do you feel like Bryce was Maggie’s saving grace in Ocracoke or was it her new found love for photography?
How do you feel that Maggie’s illness has impacted Mark in this book? How has it made her change?
Section 2
Second Trimester
Did you feel like things were going to change for the better or worse between Bryce and Maggie after the nor’easter?
Which of these characters do you feel was most impactful in Maggie’s life and why? Aunt Lynda, Gwen, Bryce or Mark
Did you think that Maggie’s birth story was going to end up the way it did?
How did you feel about Maggie’s parents throughout this story? Would you have done the same or what would you have done differently?
Did you think Bryce and Maggie would be reunited in the end? Would you have changed their love story?
Which part shocked you the most at the end of this book? Who Maggie’s child was? How Bryce and Maggie ended? How Maggie spent her last days?
Purchase your copy! https://rstyle.me/+GekyTKdy-pnHffqsAcBj0w