The Last Song

Gather initial thoughts and broad opinions about the book.

1. What was your initial emotional reaction to the novel’s ending? Did you find Steve’s death and Ronnie’s reconciliation to be a fitting conclusion to the story?

2. How does The Last Song fit within Nicholas Sparks’s body of work? If you’ve read other books by him, like A Walk to Remember or The Notebook, how does Ronnie’s coming-of-age story compare?

3. The story weaves together teenage romance, family drama, and a mystery surrounding the church fire. How effectively do you think these different plotlines are balanced throughout the novel?

Encourage readers to connect the book’s themes and characters with their personal experiences.

1. Art is a central way that characters in the book express love, grief, and regret when words fail. What role does creativity, whether it’s music, art, or another form, play in your own life for expressing difficult emotions?

2. Ronnie begins the summer with a rebellious, hostile persona that masks her deep hurt over her parents’ divorce. Have you ever found that putting up a wall or adopting a certain attitude can be a way to protect yourself emotionally?

3. A major turning point for Ronnie is discovering she has been angry at her father for something her mother did. What does this reveal about the nature of forgiveness, especially when you realize that your anger was misdirected?

4. How does the novel contrast the feeling of home in Steve’s humble bungalow with the atmosphere in the Blakelees’ opulent mansion? Where do you find a sense of belonging, and what makes a place truly feel like home for you?

5. Steve makes the difficult choice to hide his terminal illness from his children to give them one last happy summer. Do you think his decision is selfless or misguided? When is it right to protect the people you love from a painful truth?

Examine the book’s relevance to societal issues, historical events, or cultural themes.

1. The novel draws a sharp contrast between the working-class world of the Millers and the immense wealth of the Blakelee family. How does this socioeconomic divide shape the characters’ assumptions, opportunities, and relationships, particularly between Ronnie and Will?

2. What role does the Wrightsville Beach community, including Pastor Harris and the church congregation, play in the story? How does its response to the church fire and its reconstruction reflect the ways that small towns can come together in the face of tragedy?

3. The conservation of loggerhead sea turtles is a real-world environmental issue integrated into the plot. Did you find its inclusion effective in grounding the story in a specific time and place, or did it function more as a symbolic element for Ronnie’s growth?

Dive into the book’s structure, characters, themes, and symbolism.

1. The narrative shifts between the perspectives of Ronnie, Steve, Will, and Marcus, creating dramatic irony. How did this technique shape your reading experience and your understanding of the secrets that each character keeps?

2. What is the symbolic journey of the piano in the novel? How does it mirror the evolution of Ronnie and Steve’s relationship, from a source of conflict to a medium for their final reconciliation?

3. The motif of fire is consistently linked to Marcus’s destructive nature and the novel’s central secrets. In what ways does Steve’s work on the stained-glass window serve as a direct counterpoint, representing creation, faith, and healing?

4. Ronnie’s transformation is a classic coming-of-age arc. What specific moments, like her decision to guard the turtle nest or her confrontation with Marcus, are most crucial in her journey from rebellion to responsibility?

5. How are Will and Marcus positioned as foils who represent opposite moral paths? How do Ronnie’s relationships with them propel her character arc and force her to define her own values?

6. Secrets are corrosive in this story, perpetuating pain until the truth is revealed. How does the novel’s exploration of this theme compare to other works you’ve read where a hidden truth is central, such as in Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter?

Encourage imaginative and creative connections to the book.

1. For years, Steve sent Ronnie letters that she refused to open. What message do you imagine he tried to convey in one of those letters, written during the height of their estrangement?

2. The stained-glass window becomes Steve’s legacy, a physical representation of his faith and love. What kind of artistic piece would you create to honor a person or a memory that is important to you, and what would it symbolize?

3. Ronnie begins her story by referencing the church fire and a newspaper clipping. What other single object from that summer do you think she might have saved as a memento? What story would that object tell?