A Walk to Remember by Nicholas Sparks

Published 1999 · 184 pages · 48,000 words · about 3 hours at an average pace · Literary Fiction, Romance

How hard is A Walk to Remember to read?

A Walk to Remember scores 13 out of 100 for difficulty on ReadingRate, making it relatively accessible. The score is a weighted composite of nine measures: four of how hard the prose is to parse, five of how hard the meaning is to extract.

Vocabulary: 12 out of 100
Very simple vocabulary. First-person teenage narrator.
Sentence structure: 12 out of 100
Abstraction: 15 out of 100
Concrete story with moral themes delivered through action.
Information density: 20 out of 100
Lean and fast. Brief novel with no subplots.
Narrative indirection: 15 out of 100
Retrospective frame adds a layer of adult reflection.
Symbolic density: 12 out of 100
Jamie's Bible and cardigan as markers of constancy.
Ironic distance: 80 out of 100
Adult Landon is reflective but never detached or ironic.
Resolution withholding: 15 out of 100
Jamie's illness revealed midway. Outcome anticipated.
Structural complexity: 12 out of 100
Simple linear narrative with retrospective framing.

How A Walk to Remember is regarded

A Walk to Remember holds a literary regard score of 20 out of 100, weighing its place in the canon, its critical reception, its influence on other writers, and the standing of its author. Regard is measured separately from difficulty: a demanding book is not necessarily an admired one.

About the author

Nicholas Sparks