Rating: 
Summary: lovely indeed
Review: Believe the hype-this book is amazing. It really makes you think about heaven and what it may be like. It's almost as if the author was divinely inspired, the way she writes about the afterlife.
Highly recommended!
Rating: 
Summary: Amazing
Review: I love this book! I could not put it down. This book is told from a point of view that everyone wonders about. It is amazing.
Rating:
Summary: Beautifully written
Review: I am not a book reader.....I skim magazines at best. I felt drawn to this book though. Well, I couldn't put it down. I found myself re-reading paragraph's just because. It is a wonderful book that is also a bit of a mystery. If you only read one book this year...read "The Lovely Bones" You won't regret it.
Rating:
Summary: An Intriguing Perspective on the Afterlife!
Review: This book intrigued me from the very beginning. I tend to enjoy novels dealing with the relationship between the living and the dead and this was a remarkable example of just that. Ms. Sebold portrays the afterlife as a very personal experience - to each his/her own heaven ... or hell, for that matter. Susie, who was murdered at 14 years old, chooses to observe her family for many years, witnessing the effect that her death had on the lives of those she left behind. There were times when the book was a bit creepy, making me think that some dead person was watching my every move in a voyeuristic sort of way. And reading about the actions of a serial killer made me worry about my own children ...But it dealt so wonderfully with the process of mourning and letting go in times of great loss and it was also so marvelously suspenseful in certain parts that it was still a great read!
Rating: 
Summary: Don't believe the hype
Review: Sometimes the public is swept up in the hype of a product that delivers less than it claims to offer. The Lovely Bones is no exception. This novel is purported to be an insightful view of death, what tragedy means for survivors, and how those survivors navigate lives without someone they love; instead, it reads like a fictionalized account of a "Touched by an Angel" episode. The only force propelling this narrative forward was my dim curiosity about what would happen to Susie's killer - hardly the emphasis the author intended, I suspect. Additionally, Susie's experiences in heaven sound not unlike how purgatory is often described. An overly simplistic novel whose runaway success is most likely motivated by its I-Can-Read language and its appeal to sensitive types who watch PAX.
Rating: 
Summary: The Lovley Bones
Review: I first picked up this book at my boyfriends house and began reading out of curiosity. After the first chapter I was hooked and bought my own copy the same day on amazon.com. To my dissapointment the first chapter was the climax of the book. The middle of the novel was entertaining but moved less than quickly and I felt myself skimming past some of the ending chapters. By the last chapter I was down right bored, what was the whole point of this book again?
Rating:
Summary: Over-Hyped.
Review: I picked up this book because of the enormous hype behind it and from the majority of the positive testimonials here. Unfortunately I couldn't see what the big deal was. I thought the writing was ameteurish, it was uneccessarily and excessively gruesome in parts, the plot didn't engage me whatesoever, and I felt it was emotionally manipulative. The up side is it's a quick read. If you want a good cry, then by all means, carry on, but if you're looking for more message and meat in your literary choices, stick with something like 'The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay', the pulitzer winner of 2001.
Rating:
Summary: Where's the Beef?
Review: Gentle Readers...this was not my type of book. I was expecting a gritty crime story and what I got was fluff. The basic idea of the book intrigued me; however, I found most of the characters boring and the author's writing style lacking. In defense of the book, I was the ONLY member of my book club who didn't like it -- the rest of them are still raving about it. It would probably make a good movie -- so I gave it 2 stars!
Rating:
Summary: Memorably disappointing...
Review: The critical chorus about this novel is strikingly different depending upon whether you read American or British reviews. American reviewers, including other novelists such as Jonathan Franzen and Anna Quindlen, laud the book for its unsentimental, unsparing view of a tragedy, told from a unique perspective. The British reviewers indulge themselves in unnecessary hostility and sarcasm as they criticize the book for its logical inconsistencies and cloying sugary sentimentality. I don't feel hostile toward the novel, but I'm clearly living on the wrong side of the Atlantic. At my students' suggestion, we read this novel in my college literature course where the reactions were decidedly mixed. The premise of the book sounds like a gimmick, and, unfortunately, the execution does not lift the novel above that level. "The Lovely Bones" is a fast read, in part because it offers no challenges to our emotions or intellect. Complex questions that might have been raised about the afterlife, about the process of grieving, about the ripple effects of horrifying violence, about the abnormal psychology of a serial killer simply are not engaged but skirted. Somehow, Sebold has written a "feel good" novel about an awful crime. The book only succeeds in its rich portrayal of the dead girl's mother, a woman dealing with a compelling inner conflict that is exacerbated by her family's tragedy, a conflict that on its own is the stuff of a fascinating novel. The rest of the characters, however, remain flat on the page, and the book is curiously devoid of genuine emotion. Unlike the British critics, I'm not embittered nor angry at Sebold for writing the book, merely disappointed. Some observers expected the novel to receive a National Book Award nomination; I'm not surprised it has not. Should you read it? Fans of James Patterson-style splatter novels will be disappointed; this book is a cut above such thrillers. Readers seeking an accomplished literary novel would best look elsewhere.
Rating:
Summary: an interesting journey...
Review: This is one of the few books that I can honestly say kept my attention... I couldn't put it down! The book is written in first person, from the point of view of the murdered girl, Susie Salmon. The story gives you a look into the mind of Susie, who is watching the events on Earth from up in heaven. It shows how one family copes with the loss of their daughter, and how a community copes with the loss of a friend. It also shows how time is an eventual healer. The book takes you through the lives of these people, including the murderer himself, and how their lives end up. The only disappointment is the last 10 pages of the book. I thought that it ended too quickly, and that there wasn't much "closure." I felt slightly empty, but for the most part, this book was interesting and will make you think about life and what may come afterwards.
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