One Day

BOOK REPORT: -ONE DAY

In this report I will write about the important aspects of the book, along with aspects I will also do a little analysis on some of the important characters. In the end, I will also conclude this report with mentioning the reason of choosing this book.

We read and hear a lot of stories, some are interesting, and some are long or short. Every story is unique in its own way, but would you believe me If I told that this story I am writing report on spanned for twenty years.

One Day, yes One day is the novel this whole report is about. The novel One Day is written by the famous British writer David Nicholls. David Nicholls is also known for his acting and screenwriting. He has spent his 20s as a professional actor, where he played many roles at various theatres. Throughout his 30s he was seen as a screenwriter. During this period he was also garnered a nomination of Best New Writer (fiction) for a British Academy Television Craft Awards. In 2002 he wrote his first novel, Starter for ten, which was his one of the notable work. In 2005 he published his second novel the understudy and at last in 2009 he published his second notable work one day. This book was published in Great Britain for the first time. It was the biggest- selling British novel of 2010 and has been published in 31 different languages. David Nicholls has been achieving phenomenal success with this book. This bittersweetlove story has been made into a film where, Lone Scherfig directed it and Nicholls wrote the screenplay. The movie was released after two years of book publishing i.e. in August 2011. But what does makes this book so special it’s the story line, a sad/funny love story that is extended for twenty years

One day is the ultimate feel-good book about love and friendship, fear and love. The structure of this book is very original. Since the whole story is focused on two protagonist, Emma Morley and Dexter Mayhew. They are very different Edinburgh university students. The story begins on July 15, 1988 when Emma and Dexter meet each other for the first time during their college graduation. In rest of the chapters of the book we will get a snapshot of their relationships for over the course of twenty years. Each chapter falls on the same day of each year when they met for the first time. Romance does not happen between them but they remain friends. During these twenty years many ups and down comes in their life. Their twenties has been spent as normal friends where they were in touch and met occasionally but they do not involve each other in their life. Afterwards throughout their thirties, their friendship becomes more probable and strained. Where Emma began to have some feelings for Dexter and it makeher more painful to admit it that they are only friends. In the end they found that they belong to each otherand hence the result is both a different and infinitely charming love story. This book is all about the unexpected things that occur in everyone´s life, which comes either with some negative or crazy things along with some good things.

The elements I chose to describe are mainly the characters, and setting of story. The novel is set in 1988, but all the issues characters deal with are set in 90's and 2000's. The reason I chose to describe these 2 elements is because I can relate to the issues of 90's - 2000's as I grew up in the same period. Characters were also easy to describe, as there are only 2 main characters, it's the girl who's character I find more interesting. Emma is the girl in the novel, she is described as a pretty woman who is intelligent, but because of her low self-esteem, she refuses to believe it. She always sets things for less than what she is capable of. On the other hand the boy, who's name is told as Dexter is a handsome and wealthy guy, a guy whom girls would fawn over but nobody is perfect or has got everything. Just like Emma he also has some issues; he's described as very immature guy.

As I mentioned earlier, it’s the character of girl which was interesting to me, So I will write little more about her. The one, who has read the book, can easily tell that she lives a life of loneliness, because she’s depicted as being a quit sad and lonely girl. Neither does she have many friends, the only friend that she thinks she has is Dexter. Later in the novel we come to know that Dexter doesn’t really want to spend any time with her, this adds more sorrows and sadness in to her character. At points I felt sad for Emma, but when the story moves on a lot of positivity comes in to her character, she realizes a lot of things, which makes something of her life and changes it around. She becomes a determined woman and knows what she wants, and stops taking no for an answer.

Emma plays equally big role as Dexter does in the story. What makes this story even more interesting is them being opposite of each other. They work well together and seem the most unlikely couple to ever get together. The writer has put a lot of effort in making these two characters, sometimes I felt he took the personalities of characters to the extreme, which made me wonder sometimes. But it could just be me, everyone has their own point of view and way of understanding things. One could also understand or feel that there is an undercurrent of support and genuine care for one another, even if they don’t always show it.

One day is very funny book but at the same time it is also poignant, touching and at times just plain pretty sad. I cried many times but then I laughed as well. I think that the concept behind this book is very interesting. Since how amazing it can be to write about a specific day in a person´s life through year after year. For me it was fascinating to follow Dexter and Emma through the late eighties, ninety years and later in the 2000 century. I was really engrossed in the lives of Dexter and Emma. I always wanted to know more about them and their future, I kept thinking all the way that if their friendship once going to result in something deeper and stronger than just friendship or it would remain as it. But still when I was reading, I notice that the David Nicholls jumped a bit in time, both forward and back at the end of the book. I cannot quite get some of the main characters, and because of this I did not feel particularly enriched after reading. But by all means, it was easy and good book to read. However, I recommend all of you to read this book; it is the perfect travel book, which does not require too much effort to read while you are sitting in airplanes or airports.

The reason of choosing this book was that for a while this book was in my possession. A few months back I had read about 80 pages of it. But then suddenly I took a hiatus, there was no specific reason of taking break I just did it. May be because I came back to it so enchanted few days ago that I finished the rest of the book. Basically this enthralled came when our teacher gave us assignment of a book report. Since One Day was my obsession and as well as my incomplete book that I needed to complete it, therefore I selected One Day to read.