A Walk to Remember, Nicholas Sparks. (Bantam Books, £5.99)

IT is 1958 and Landon Carter is 17. He lives in North Carolina, near the beach side of Beaufort, a small southern town. Everyone knows everyone else and their business.

Church life is important here, and unknown to Landon the people of the church are going to become really important to him.

If he had any idea of it he would have run a mile. It isn't hip to be known as religious. In fact there are a lot of things that you wouldn't want to be known for. Girlfriends have to be attractive, friends have to be cool. You get the drift?

This year is Landon's final at high school, so he decides to do the easy option and take a drama class. No exams you see.

However, and it's a big one here; the class is doing the church play. Hegbert Sullivan wrote the play The Christmas Angel some time ago, and it is well supported by all the groups in town.

Jamie Sullivan, Hegbert's daughter is cast as the Angel of the title. The leading male is up for grabs and Landon is asked to audition.

It isn't that he doesn't want the part, but Jamie Sullivan is an enigma to him. Not pretty, but not plain, Jamie is a good student with many attributes.

However, she is definitely not the sort of girl who is popular with the boys. I mean there is her father for a start. Jamie attracts him, but he is confused as to the reasons why. He then decides to ask her to the school prom.

This is a serious consideration. He doesn't want people to speculate about them, but on the other hand, he doesn't want to go to the dance alone.

The relationship between the two adolescents is fraught with the usual dramas, but Landon gets the part in the play, and as a consequence they see a lot of each other in the ensuing weeks.

Then Landon discovers that Jamie is seriously ill. How he deals with difficult relationships, both with his father and Jamie's and his growth from boy to man is the key to this charming book.

Nicholas Sparks has written several books, one Message in a Bottle was recently filmed with Kevin Costner in the lead. Sentimentality is easy to impart, but depth of feeling and the bittersweet theme of this tale is heart-rending. Get out the tissues.

Annie Dendy