This book was not supposed to make me cry.

رواية يكتبها (نيكولاس) بمساعدة أخيه (ميكا) وذلك عندما يقرران قضاء رحلة حول العالم معاً، فهذه الرواية ليست مجرد رواية من خيال الكاتب، بل هي قصة حقيقية واقعية ومواقف عاشها الكاتب، وهذا ما يجعلها أقرب وأصدق وأعمق.
وليست كذلك سيرة ذاتية لحياتهما فقط -مع كون هذا أكثر ما أهمني وما ركزت فيه- وإنما هو يُعتبر من أدب الرحلات، فتارة يذكر عن الرحلة وعن مغامراته فيها مع أخيه، وما شاهداه -وإن له وصف جميل أعجبني- وتارة يرجع للماضي ليتذاكر مع أخيه عن حياتهما وطفولتهما بكل ما يتخللها من مغامرة وشقاوة ومواقف محزنة كانت أو طريفة.. لينتجا لنا رواية رائعة يدمجان فيها بين السيرة الذاتية وأدب الرحلات..

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فمن جانب كون الكتاب يعتبر من السير الذاتية: فأنا أحب القصص العائلية، وأجواءها، استمتعت بتفاصيلها، وبالمواقف التي مروا بها، وأعجبت بأبطالها، بداية من شخصية أمه الصارمة والحنونة، وأبيه القاريء النهم والمثقف، مروراً بأخيه الإجتماعي والمرح، وأخته اللطيفة والمدللة، وانتهاءاً بشخصيته هو، وكيف أنه استطاع النجاح في حياته بالرغم من شعوره المتكرر من أنه لم يحظى بكثير من الإهتمام لكونه الأخ الأوسط ترتيباً. ويقول في ذلك:
"كمعظم الأطفال كنت أعتقد أن الإهتمام يساوي الحب نوعاً ما، من بين الأطفال الثلاثة، كنت أنال مقداراً أقل من الأول متضمناً مقداراً أقل من الثاني، فكان ميكا بالرغم من كل شيء، يعامل كراشدٍ، ولأنه كان أول من يجرب كل شيء من المشي إلى الكلام إلى الوقوع في المتاعب، فقد تلقى الإهتمام الذي يمنح لأولئك الذين يحتلون قائمة الأسرة. أما أختي من جهة أخرى وهي الأصغر سناً والفتاة الوحيدة فقد كانت تمنح امتيازات مضاعفة تقريباً، إذ كانت تقضي وقت أطول مع أمي مني ومن أخي، وتقوم بأعمال منزلية أقل ونادراً ما تقع في المتاعب، وكانت الوحيدة التي تحصل على أكثر من زوجٍ من الأحذية في نفس الوقت، ويكون التفسير: "إنها فتاة""
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أعجبتني علاقته بأخيه، ودور الأم والأسرة بشكل عام في التمكن من حل المشكلات .. مع وجود الإحترام المتبادل، ولطالما اعتقدت أن الدور الأكبر في التربية يقع على عاتق الأم، وأظن نيكولاس يؤكد اعتقادي.. مهما كان المستوى المادي ضعيفاً، فأسلوب والدته في حل المشكلات أعجبني، فلم تكن متهكمة، ولم تكن مبالغة في الخوف عليهما، وأكثر ما أعجبني هو التدخل في الوقت المناسب، كما كانت لهما الحرية في اكتشاف المجتمع الخارجي، وهذا ما جعل لكل منهما شخصيته الخاصة.. ثم إن هذا الكتاب يخبرنا أن الحياة متقلبة، ولا تستقر على جانب واحد، فلابد من العيش في هذه الحياة بحلوها ومرها لنتعلم منها.


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أما ما يتعلق برحلتهما من جانب كونها من أدب الرحلات: فكنت أرجع إلى الأنترنت لأرى ما وصف في جمال المكان، فقد كان وصفه بديعاً، ومن تلك الأماكن (كوانتناما) وما ذكره عن مدينة (تيكال)، والعديد غيرها.. ومن ذلك في وصفه لصخرة (آيرز روك) في استراليا، وأنه كان يظنها كذبة إعلامية ولكنها حقيقة فقال في وصفها:
"أصابت الشمس الصخرة في زاوية بحيث إنها بدأت تتوهج باللون الأحمر وكأنها جمرة ضخمة متوهجة. كان كل ما استطعت وميكا فعله للدقائق القليلة التالية هو التحديق بها ونحن نفكّر أنها كانت إحدى أكثر الأشياء التي رأيتاها في حياتنا إدهاشاً."
وطبعاً دخلت الإنترنت في يوتيوب تحديداً لأرى هذه الصخرة العجيبة فكما تعلمون لم يعد الأمر صعباً، فبضغطة زر يظهر لك ما تريد، وهذا من محاسن الإنترنت، فكان أن رأيتها صخرة عجيبة ومدهشة بالفعل، فقلت سبحان الله.

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بعض الملاحظات:
1. قرأته سنة 2013 وهائنذا أضع المراجعة هنا، كما كتبتها آنذاك، مع بعض التعديلات.
2. لكم كنت سعيدة لاقتنائي لهذا الكتاب، لينضم إلى مكتبتي الصغيرة..
2. الصور المدرجة في هذه المراجعة، تم أخذها من الكتاب ، كما توجد فيه عدة صور أخرى، تخيرت منها هذه.

My more snobbish literary friends find it humorous that I've ever read a Nicholas Sparks book, imagine if they knew I've read two. However, this book was one of the first self-written memoirs I had read and I was so deeply moved by it. Sparks has talent, he's not one of the great literary forces of the past century, but his innate ability to commiserate with his audience is uncommon.

You will not regret reading this book, no matter what sort of reader you are. The story is heart-wrenching and hilarious, and most impressively, humble. Sparks is not selling himself or any product or idea. This isn't one of those tacky, "I made it and here's how" guides by gaudy charlatans with ghost-writers. "The Weeks with My Brother" has substance, and I'm proud to place it on my bookshelf between Rimbaud and Tsvetaeva.

3.5 stars, but I choose to round down because this book has gotten a lot of hype which perhaps left me feeling disappointed.

The story wasn't what I expected. It's formatted as one part travel guide, one part memoir. I found the travel portions somewhat boring, inasmuch as I thought this would be a travel adventure in the vein of Wild by Cheryl Strayed, or a life-and-death nail-biter like 127 Hours.

In contrast, the memoir is a sweet tribute to the enduring love between two brothers who have suffered a disproportionate amount of neglect and loss and yet conduct themselves with humor and good grace. But their individual and shared misfortunes are tempered by incredible good fortune in becoming a millionaire author and businessman, respectively. And their saintly wives--I mean, what woman with five kids (and a mostly unhelpful writer husband whose primary "chore" is getting the mail so he can escape the household chaos) says, with a smile on her face, "Sure honey, take this three week around-the-world vacation with your brother while I stay here taking care of our five kids"?! I confess I lost all affinity with the author from that moment forward.

That being said, Three Weeks With My Brother contained enough touching moments and moving passages to keep me engaged and earn a "better than average" rating.

I have never read a Nicholas Sparks book before in my life. Nor have I seen any of the movies based on his books. To tell you the truth, his stuff has always looked very cheesy, generic, and melodramatic to me.

However, this is not one of his fiction books. This is a two-part memoir, written with his older brother Micah. One part of the memoir is about their childhood. The other part is about a 3-week trip around the world that they took together in 2002. Each chapter starts with a certain phase of their lives (i.e. the first chapter starts with birth) and then leads into a part of the trip they took.

I won't say that this book isn't without a healthy dose of cheese. But it's still gripping. The Sparks brothers' lives weren't exactly charmed. They had happy childhoods, even though they grew up desperately poor. Stories of their early years are funny, alarming, and bittersweet all at the same time. And later in life, while they both saw great fortune come their way, they also saw a lot of tragedy.

In the end, I really came to admire their strength and perseverance. I also laughed out loud multiple times. Not quite 100% heartwarming, but 100% enjoyable.

Title a little misleading. The book is really 50% about the author's vacation with his brother, and 50% about the life story of his complete family.
But both parts are done very well just as equally.

Fabulous, fabulous book. It is one thing when an author can think of a story and write it from thin air exactly the way he wants it to go, but to take the nitty gritty truth of a story and stick to it shows integrity to writing. This could be my favorite of all Sparks' books, simply because of the truth to it and his amazing ability to merge the story of traveling with his brother with their life story. A favorite of all his books...that's saying a lot!

This is a tough book to review. It was really fascinating to me to hear about Nicholas Sparks' life. It was emotional and unbelievable that anyone could go through so much sadness in their life. As with most of his books, this one got me teary eyed a few times. The story itself goes through his trip around the world with his brother, most of which I found a little boring. Then, intertwined is the story of his life, that part was good. I found myself skimming, or skipping all together, a lot of the trip part. It's kind of ironic that a trip around the world would make someone feel better, and be closer to their brother. If I were a millionaire, I would probably feel the same way. It seems a bit unrealistic for regular people to ever get to experience that type of adventure. Sadly, I would have probably enjoyed the book more it I were just hearing about his life growing up. Overall, I think he needs to stick to fiction. That's where his true talent lies.

I don't often give 1 star reviews but this book was just terrible. The writing is just so-so but to be fair, I expected that. What I really didn't like was the author himself.

In the book, Sparks starts out by relying to readers how "normal" his life really is and that he really is just like the rest of us, despite what people think. Of course, just a few pages later, he purchases tickets for his trip around the world and seems to have no idea that "normal" people cannot simply put their lives on hold so they can go off and travel the world with their sibling. But hey, don't get me wrong, if I could do just that in order to do some soul-seeking, I probably world.

Next, Sparks talks wonderfully about his wife and thats great. However, he makes many comments throughout the book and is very open about his role, or lack thereof, in raising his children and helping his wife out with household duties. He again seems to see no issue with this man-child type life he has, even simply telling readers that all his wife asks is that he handle the mail. Wow, Sparks, what a man. Of course, he soon leaves on what must be an incredibly expensive vacation while his wife and children wait back at home. My impression was that they probably wouldn't notice he was gone.

Thirdly, while providing readers with the details, and I do mean details, of his trip, I cannot help but to feel like I am reading about a teenage boy on a trip with his brother, not a grown man on a trip with his grown brother. He even makes comments about field guides telling them they are "troublemakers" and gives us his stories of rowdiness.

Throughout the book, Sparks shares all sorts of bland conversations that he and his brother had throughout the trip while then reverting back to his childhood where he grew up poor. Somehow, I believe readers are supposed to be captivated by all this but obviously, I was not. And the apparent "lessons" that we seem to be learning are things like...life is not fair, family is important, and God blesses those who love Him... but Sparks provides no substance here either.

The book is simply boring even beyond the annoyance of reading about a man-child. I am ALL for people finding themselves and discovering what the world has to offer. In fact, I tend to REALLY like books centered around such subjects. However, this one is just oh-so bland and I could never get beyond the annoyances or pointlessness. It seemed to go absolutely nowhere and needless to say, I pitied his wife and kids.

I had no idea Nicholas Sparks had been through so much heartache in his young adult life. I loved learning new fact about places I’ll never see. This is a touching tribute to Nicholas and Micah’s family. This book is beautiful and you won’t be disappointed ❤️

Pretty interesting memoir of Nicholas Sparks. But I was expecting a much more in-depth relationship memoir with just his brother, Micah. But very little is told of the 3 week trip around the world. It focuses more on his life starting in childhood and ending in 2004. I also thought there would be more about Micah's story told by Micah but there is not. All-in-all, the Sparks dealt with a lot of tragedy and it is told very well.

هذه المرة الأولى التي أقرأ فيها لـ نيكولاس سباركس ، استمتعت جداً ، ذكريات الطفولة ومغامرات الشباب ، كل التفاصيل كانت جميلة وممتعة ، الرواية قد أقرب لسيرة عائلة سباركس أكثر من كونها سيرة أخَوَين وصديقين ومُغامرَين .

الرواية تستحق القراءة ، بل إنها ممتعة جداً
Five stars