Rating: 
Summary: Great Expectations
Review: I read this book. I am now, periodically, reading the reviews with great interest (as well as reading another book with an unusual presentation, Norman Thomas Remick's "West Point"). People seem to either love Alice Sebold's "The Lovely Bones", or hate it. I think it is due to the enormous amount of PR it has had, for some reason that I for one certainly cannot explain. The PR has created great expectations. Some people may have expected too much. Though far from perfect, I still rate it at least a 5(-) star book of fiction owing to a creative and interesting presentation that I enjoyed.
Also recommended: Norman Thomas Remick's "West Point: ...Thomas Jefferson", another creative presentation I am reading that, unlike "The Lovely Bones", is non-fiction and quite a little education so far.
Rating: 
Summary: disturbing read
Review: This book is haunting and disturbing. I have a small daughter, and this may account for my evaluation, but I can imagine that it would be disturbing just the same for any normal person. The book forces one to be reminded of the fact that life can be utterly brutal and that horror exists in life. I liked the way the father was developed, and also the little brother. I didn't like the author's heaven. I assume that heaven is heaven, and at least you achieve peace and "happiness", that is beyond this world. Susie was in purgatory I believe. Maybe I am sensitive, but the book affected me strongly. The author did succeed in making her message felt. I don't like the book because of its grimness, but out of respect for the victims of horror I have to acknowledge its effect. I am trying to come to terms with it.
Rating:
Summary: Captivating
Review: I had a hard time getting through the first chapter due to the realistic and gruesome details. I was told to keep going. Once I did, I was hooked! I found myself waking up at night and my mind would go to the book so naturally I had to get up and read a chapter or two! This book made you look at life through the eyes of a child and look at what heaven possibly could be. Either way, it was a thought provoking novel which I highly recomend.
In addition, The Nanny Diaries is also one that I could not put done but was totally different.
Rating: 
Summary: Intruiging, haunting, beautifully written
Review: The story of Susie Salmon's death and subsequent character in heaven is a disturbing but absorbing read. Susie, 14-years-old, is brutally raped and murdered on her way home from school one day. What ensues is a description of the unfolding experiences of her family -- including their search for the killer -- as Susie looks down upon them from heaven, unable to communicate with them and desparate to be alive and grow up with them. The book is especially haunting because the author, Alice Seybold, herself was raped. Seybold is a gifted writer and one who is able to wrap hope and beauty into the plot, despite the grim events. In addition, she brings the characters to life; each of susie's friends and family members are well-developed. The plot is intruiging every step of the way. All 8 women in my book club were moved by this book. If you enjoy good writing and can withstand the topic of the rape and murder of a young girl, you will be very taken with the story of Susie Salmon.
Rating:
Summary: Didn't meet my expectations
Review: I had heard so much about this book I had to give it a try. It certainly provides the reader with a different and rather unique perspective from which to follow a story. The book did touch an emmotional chord with me and the story did move right along, but I guess I was just expecting more - I never really felt any connection with the characters, nor even gained an understanding of the characters. If you would like to try another book with a different treatment of how a child "taken" from a family affects the lives of individual family members, I suggest you try my book, "The Other Part Of Me." I think you will find it emmotional and very suspensful.
Rating:
Summary: Lovely book
Review: I have heard about this book for a long time and finally sat down to read it....and didn't get up until I finished. It was sad, touching, funny and sweet all at the same time. It is hard to get through the first couple of chapters without crying, but well worth it.
Rating: 
Summary: Bad Ending
Review: The first of the book held me. As it continued, I became frustrated trying to figure out who she was talking about at that moment. The ending was terrible and very unsatisfying.
Rating: 
Summary: Capra's angels were more believable.
Review: Seldom do I agree with a New York Review of Books in so many particulars as I did concerning The Lovely Bones. The author begins with an interesting premise, but the execution is anything but satisfying. It's all spun sugar; it lacks substance. Susie's heaven has precedence in certain Theosophical and spiritualist accounts which describe the afterlife in terms of a myriad of subjective environments. Each soul goes to the one it is most comfortable with. One may ask for or create new elements (e.g., an addition to one's home) therein, and may move from one to another as one feels ready or becomes curious. Unfortunately, this was the only interesting element in the book. Far from handling the gruesome realities of life as Ms. Sebold has claimed was her goal, the story quickly degenerates into a lot of drivel about relationships. It is something like what the less sentimental of both sexes refer to as a chick movie; it isn't even a good one, since a true production of that genre at least attempts to make the audience sympathise deeply with the characters in their situations. Sebold tends to describe emotions in such a way as to make us feel no immediacy, no genuine tugs at the heartstrings whatsoever. I wonder was this book seized upon because of its portrayal of Susie in her afterlife? It certainly wasn't due to Sebold's lackluster depiction of Susie's killer and the hunt for same. I essentially read this book through hoping to find out how they would catch him, and was disappointed even in that. Worst of all, toward the end of the book, Sebold begins to cheat. She's established that people in Heaven may observe earthly affairs, but are unable to intervene; now, she breaks that rule. Susie is allowed to return to earth via semi-voluntary possession of a friend -- I read the reason as that she'd never had an orgasm and felt she'd missed out on a fundamental experience of life. Surely there are equivalent states of rapture in Paradise? The rule is broken again a few pages later, causing a conclusion even less satisfying than it was already. I prefer Capra's ungainly, nightshirted second-class guardian angel to the fare proffered us by Sebold. Capra let us feel that ghastly tragedy full force, the angel's intervention lets us see how much worse it could have been, and while the ending is not entirely realistic (particularly from a legal standpoint) it contains a fulfillment that Sebold's little ditty lacks.
Rating:
Summary: The Best Book I have ever read
Review: The Lovely Bones is on of the best books I have ever read. Even with all the difficulties of looking upon a grieving family, friends, a detective who has been faced with many unsolved crimes and the grusome murder. I was fortunite enough to come a long this book, as part of an assignment for a psychology class. With a story line I will never forget, and an author who has had a beautiful debut, this book is likely to become my all time favorite, and read over and over again.
Rating:
Summary: Heartbreaking... but worth the tears
Review: I just finished reading Alice Sebold's The Lovely Bones. I do believe that this book is destined to become a classic, as a reviewer wrote on the book jacket. Our perception of heaven is challenged, and that is what makes great literature--to challenge how we see things now. Alice Sebold writes sparingly, with every word and phrase meaning something. The subtle nuances of life and relationships are told well. This was the saddest book I have ever read. It was also the most uplifting book as well. Heaven is HERE on earth, and through this story, I have learned to appreciate all that we have been given. If you read this book, be prepared for it to engulf your life while you are reading it. The characters seem so real. The issues in the book had closure, which helped, in the end, to give an uplifting tone to the story. Definitely worth the tears.
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