Counting Miracles by Nicholas Sparks
Counting Miracles is Nicholas Sparks’ latest novel — his 25th — and it is a wonderfully heart-warming read that will be heading for the big screen in an adaptation by Amazon. The New York Times bestselling author has set the story in Asheboro, North Carolina, crafting an uplifting tale of three characters whose lives unexpectedly come together: a beleaguered old man using the last energy he has to protect the endangered white deer from poachers in his mountain town, a former Army Ranger tracing his new-found North Carolina roots after the loss of the grandmother who raised him, and a busy small-town doctor raising her two lively teenagers as a divorced mom.
Three Lives, One Chance Encounter
Former Army Ranger Tanner Hughes has spent most of his life overseas, with years of government service in Cameroon, Cote d’Ivoire and Haiti and no ties to anyone but the grandmother who raised him. About to return to Cameroon for a new job, he stops by Asheboro on his way, for a very specific reason. On her deathbed his grandmother delivered a bombshell: revealing the name of Tanner’s father and that he was from Asheboro. Tanner comes to town on a quick hunt for clues about his past before heading to Africa.
Kaitlyn works as an internist in Asheboro while juggling care of her sixteen-year-old daughter Casey and nine-year-old son Mitch. Divorced four years, she is devoted to her kids and her patients with no time for much else.
When Casey gets in a jam at a bar in town with an aggressive would-be boyfriend and a car wreck Tanner helps her out and delivers her back home. Meeting Tanner on her doorstep, Kaitlyn impulsively says yes to this highly attractive man with a mysterious past when he asks her out for a drink. But finding out he’s only in town briefly negates the chance of anything more than a date or two, in her mind at least. Nonetheless, her daughter’s comment that Kaitlyn might have forgotten how to be happy gives Kaitlyn pause.
A Battle for Belief, Family, and a Legendary Deer
The elderly Jasper may be the most lovable character in the story. Jasper aligns his own life to that of Old Testament Job, who’d been tried by God to make sure his faith was not just from his having a good life. With his face disfigured from a horrific accident years earlier and his health precarious, the eighty-three-year-old Jasper’s belief in God is at a low ebb.
Kaitlyn is Jasper’s devoted doctor and as some kind of thanks he spends a day a week devoting himself to teaching her son Mitch how to whittle. The first time they meet, sight of the old man’s face shocks Mitch.
“’You’re him,’ the young boy stammered. ‘The man in the cabin … Do you really eat children?’
‘No,’ he said. ‘I’d rather have tomato soup or chili.’”
Mitch admires the little wooden animals that are Jasper’s main hobby and they begin a weekly lesson in whittling. And best of all, the boy no longer “seemed perturbed by his appearance, which made it matter not at all that the boy still couldn’t whittle worth a lick.”
Jasper and his senior dog Arlo live just south of Asheboro in a cabin built by his father and himself when he was fifteen. Jasper’s cabin is surrounded on three sides by the Uwharrie National Forest, game lands for hunting, trapping and fishing and home — as rumor has it — to an amazingly rare and legendary white deer that is roaming the area. With hunting season about to start, Jasper risks his fragile life to stop very real poachers who are hot on the trail of his precious deer. Tanner and Kaitlyn must step up to save him but it still may take a miracle.
Finding Where You Belong
In a sense all three main characters in Counting Miracles meet each other at a crossroads in their lives. Having lost all else that mattered in his life, Jasper would die for the cause of his beloved white deer. Despite Tanner’s appeal and the need for more fun in her life, Kaitlyn cannot imagine altering her priorities or her steady life. And while Tanner is intrigued by his best friend’s rich marriage and family life, he sees no place for either thing; like for Kaitlyn, his old life seems the safest.
In the end, Tanner’s grandmother’s dying words ring the most true: “Find where you belong and make that place your own.” Such a sense of belonging — whether you are eighty-three or nine — is everything to all of us. True to his fashion, Nicholas Sparks has written another novel that you won’t want to put down until the last powerful chapter is done.
Learn more about the upcoming adaptation of Counting Miracles
About Nicholas Sparks:
Nicholas Sparks is a globally renowned storyteller, with all his books becoming New York Times bestsellers. He has sold over 130 million copies worldwide, including 92 million in the U.S., with works translated into more than 50 languages. Sparks’ most famous novel, The Notebook, was written at age 28 and published in 1996. He followed with numerous bestsellers, including Message in a Bottle, A Walk to Remember, The Last Song, and Dear John. His 25th novel, Counting Miracles, releases on September 24, 2024.
Many of Sparks’ novels have been adapted into successful films, grossing over $750 million worldwide. The Notebook has also been adapted into a musical, with music by Ingrid Michaelson.
Living in North Carolina, Sparks supports local and national charities and contributes to the University of Notre Dame’s Creative Writing Program. He co-founded The Epiphany School in 2006 and coached track and field, with his team setting national and world records. Through the Nicholas Sparks Foundation, he has donated over $15 million to scholarships and charitable programs, with 100% of donations going directly to causes.
