Safe Haven

Safe Haven is a novel by New York Times bestselling author Nicholas Sparks. Written in 2010, Safe Haven was adapted into a movie of the same name in 2013. Like most of Sparks’s novels, the setting of this story is North Carolina. The author often uses his home state as a backdrop to his romances, incorporating the beauty and history of the state as a central motif. In this novel, Sparks contrasts the beauty and warmth of a North Carolina spring and summer against the frozen landscape of an East Coast winter. By doing so, Sparks expands on a theme of hope contrasted against a theme of despair. Other works by this author include The Notebook, A Walk to Remember, and The Longest Ride.

This study guide refers to the September 2010 Grand Central Publishing, a division of Hachette Book Group, Inc., e-book edition of this novel.

Plot Summary

Katie is a waitress at Ivan’s, a charming diner in the small town of Southport, North Carolina. She arrived in Southport with just enough money to put down a month’s rent on an old hunting cabin and not much more.