Longest Ride

Two couples. Two love stories. One epic tale. Ninety-one-year-old Ira Levinson is in trouble. Struggling to stay conscious after a car crash, with his mind fading, an image of his adored - and long-dead - wife Ruth appears. Urging him to hang on, she lovingly recounts the joys and sorrows of their life together - how they met, the dark days of WWII and its unrelenting effect on their families. A few miles away, college student Sophia Danko's life is about to change. Recovering from a break-up, she meets the young, rugged Luke and is thrown into a world far removed from her privileged school life. Sophia sees a new and tantalising future for herself, but Luke is keeping a secret that could destroy it all. Ira and Ruth. Sophia and Luke. Two couples, separated by years and experience, whose lives are about to converge in the most unexpected - and shocking - of ways. The new love story from the multi-million-copy bestselling author of The Notebook, The Lucky One and The Best of Me. Nicholas Sparks is one of the world's most beloved authors.


Biography
Nicholas Sparks is one of the world's most beloved storytellers. All of his books have been New York Times bestsellers, with over 100 million copies sold worldwide, in more than 50 languages, including over 65 million copies in the United States alone.

Sparks wrote one of his best-known stories, The Notebook, over a period of six months at age 28. It was published in 1996 by Warner Books. He followed with the novels Message in a Bottle (1998), A Walk to Remember (1999), The Rescue (2000), A Bend in the Road (2001), Nights in Rodanthe (2002), The Guardian (2003), The Wedding (2003), True Believer (2005) and its sequel, At First Sight (2005), Dear John (2006), The Choice (2007), The Lucky One (2008), The Last Song (2009), Safe Haven (2010), The Best of Me (2011), and The Longest Ride (2013), as well as the 2004 non-fiction memoir Three Weeks With My Brother, co-written with his brother Micah. His eighteenth novel, See Me, will be published on October 13, 2015.

The Choice, Sparks's eleventh film adaptation and on which he served as a Producer, will open on February 5, 2016. Including this year's The Longest Ride, along with The Best of Me, Safe Haven, The Lucky One, Message in a Bottle, A Walk to Remember, The Notebook, Nights in Rodanthe, Dear John and The Last Song, adaptations of Nicholas Sparks novels have a cumulative worldwide gross of over three-quarters of a billion dollars.

In 2012, Sparks and his publishing agent and creative partner Theresa Park, launched Nicholas Sparks Productions, with Park as President of Production. A film adaptation of The Choice, which Lionsgate will release in February, is the first independent feature from NSP. It stars Benjamin Walker and Teresa Palmer, and is directed by Ross Katz, with a screenplay adaptation by Bryan Sipe. Sparks and Theresa Park partnered with Peter Safran to produce and finance the film. A film version of The Guardian is also in development, as is a film based on football hall of famer Gayle Sayers's life and memoir.

Not only a film, but also a television production company, NSP currently have an overall deal with Warner Brothers Television and is developing a new slate of projects including a musical series, several comedies, a dark family cable drama, and a Young Adult book series for ABC Family. Most recently, the CW Network announced that it is developing a series based on Sparks's bestselling 1996 novel (and the 2004 New Line sleeper hit film) The Notebook. The project is a Nicholas Sparks Productions in association with Warner Bros. Television. Sparks will serve as an executive producer on the project along with Theresa Park. Todd Graff is the writer and executive producer.

Sparks lives in North Carolina. He contributes to a variety of local and national charities, and is a major contributor to the Creative Writing Program (MFA) at the University of Notre Dame, where he provides scholarships, internships, and a fellowship annually. He co-founded The Epiphany School in New Bern, North Carolina in 2006. As a former full scholarship athlete (he still holds a track and field record at the University of Notre Dame) he also spent four years coaching track and field athletes at the local public high school. In 2009, the team he coached at New Bern High School set a World Junior Indoor Record in the 4 x400 meter, in New York. The record still stands. Click to watch the Runner's World video with Nicholas.

The Nicholas Sparks Foundation, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit committed to improving cultural and international understanding through global education experiences for students of all ages was launched in 2011. Between the foundation, and the personal gifts of the Sparks family, more than $15 million dollars have been distributed to deserving charities, scholarship programs, and projects. Because the Sparks family covers all operational expenses of the foundation, 100% of donations are devoted to programs.

Find out more about the authors and his works by visiting www.NicholasSparks.com.