Safe Haven

Safe Haven

Safe Haven is a romance novel by Nicholas Sparks. Expressing themes of love, secrets, and what it truly means to be safe, Safe Haven was another very successful novel by Nicholas Sparks. It is starring Julianne Hough, Josh Duhamel, and Cobie Smulders.

Katie (Julianne Hough), a young woman leaves her house after doing something with a bloody knife. She is shown moments later buying a bus ticket. The bus stops at this real small town. She now claims this town as her home.

At the general store in this town, she introduces herself as Katie. After getting a job as a waitress and purchasing a cozy little home in the woods, Katie becomes friends with her neighbor Jo and Alex. Alex has two children and is the owner of the convenience store in town. Alex’s wife passed away from cancer a few years prior.

Alex starts to fall for Katie and doing little things to help her out. The two go canoeing and fall in love. The kids come around and love Katie as well.

Katie’s past husband who is also a police officer searches for Katie. He is also an alcoholic and is not a good person. Alex finds out that there is a police report that they are looking for her and confronts Katie and gets mad because she wasn’t honest and her real name is Erin. He is also mad that he let his children around her. Her husband’s boss finds out that he sent out flyers looking for her and he gets suspended from his job. The husband would abuse Katie and physically beat her many times.

Katie packs up all her belongings and decides to flee before anyone can find her. Josh rushes to her house to find that it is empty and that Katie has already packed all her belongings. He drives to the ferry and tells her how much he loves her and that he will protect her no matter what. Katie still wanted to leave but eventually decided to stay. She explains the whole story to Alex and he is completely understanding and really cares about Katie.

Her ex husband breaks into Katie's neighbor`s home back in Boston and finds the phone number to the Southport restaurant that employs Katie. He finds the location and makes his way there. Arriving just on time for the Fourth of July parade, he begins his search for Katie through the crowd. He finally finds Katie and watches from a distance her dancing with Alex and watches as he leans over to kiss her, which makes him angry. Later, Katie has a dream that she is standing on the docks watching the fireworks when Jo comes up and tells Katie that "he" is here.

Katie wakes up and walks around in the convenience store and her ex husband spooks her. He is drunk and crying and asks Katie to move back to Boston with him. Katie refuses and tells him to leave. He pours gasoline all over the store and pulls out a lighter. Katie sees what he has done and sees that he has a lighter. She runs out and says she will go back with him. She then surprises him and pushes him in the water. A firework spark lands on the gasoline though and lit the entire store on fire. Alex sees the store has caught on fire. He gets on the boat and rushes across the lake. He begs Lexie to jump into his arms because she is stuck in the store. While this is happening, Katie and her ex husband are wrestling and he is trying to shoot her. After a long fight he finally pulls the trigger. She pushes him off of her and runs into Alex’s arms.

In the rubble Alex finds the desk his wife had and it still had all the letters she wrote in it. Alex gives Katie the letter with the words “To Her” written on it. The letter talks about whoever is reading this that Josh loves them very much and reveals that Katie’s neighbor was actually Alex’s wife and Katie could only see her.

I loved this movie. It was well written and I am a huge fan of Nicholas Sparks. He always writes great stories. This is definitely one of favorites alongside The Notebook.