On Sparks' own website, he tells the story of his inspiration for The Notebook. He says his wife's grandparents were unable to come to their wedding, and that made his wife very sad. The day after the wedding, his wife asked him to do something for her. She asked him to put on his tuxedo, and she put on her wedding dress. She gathered flowers she'd brought back to the hotel from the reception, a video of the wedding and a piece of wedding cake, and went to her grandparents' house. Her grandfather even put on a sports jacket and pinned a boutonniere to his lapel. They took photographs and had a wonderful time, and the nice couple told Sparks their story.

That story, told by a couple who had been together for more than 60 years, touched Sparks almost as much as how his wife's grandparents acted together after such a long marriage. Sparks comments that after sixty years, they were acting the same way he and his wife, married one day, were. He thought it was a story of true love that lasts forever, and that's what he gave us with Noah and Allie in The Notebook.