The Lovely Bones

Rating:
Summary: I was surprised to discover
Review: just what this book was about. I both laughed and cried at this lovely book. In a rather remarkable way this is a heartwarming book written by Salman, a young teenager and her conversations and reflections and concerns about her family and, in particular, a friend made in an instant!

I guarantee that you will like this book...and it is a page-turner.

Rating:
Summary: Sebold's Rambling Psychotherapy
Review: I very much wanted to read The Lovely Bones when I heard about it, because I thought that the concept of a story being told from the point of view of a dead character watching from heaven was an intriguing narrative tool. I still think that it probably is an interesting tool, but Sebold fails to take advantage of it here.

As many readers probably know, from the author's other publication, Alice Sebold was a victim of rape during her teenage years. The Lovely Bones reads like Sebold simply tooled up her journal entries, added in some fictional out of body (or is it 'in someone else's body'?) experience, and convinced someone to publish it. The book has basically no plot, which is where it fails on the narratives. The author fails to define a problem, let alone set about solving it. The book instead rambles on in somewhat this fashion, from the main character's point of view:I was raped and murdered, bummer. My family is having a terrible time getting over it, big bummer. They aren't going to catch my killer, major bummer. I just fell down from heaven and possesed another person's body (ala Patrick Swayze in Ghost) and had sex with a guy, something I didn't get to do before I died, cool. The End.

The entire book reads like the author was self administering psychotherapy. Oh, look what happened to me and my family! Isn't it awful? While it is true that there is something compelling about this book from a voyeristic point of view (the only reason that it got 2 stars), it basically doesn't live up to it's promise. Unless a reader enjoys feeling like a voyer while watching this family go through tons of pain, they aren't likely to enjoy this book. While I, and I'm sure all readers, sympathize with Miss Sebold's horrible expereince, it certainly doesn't make good fiction.

Alice Sebold promises to be a good writer, but she needs to stop trying so hard to be brilliant and different and try working a little more at the basics of plot. Those familiar with the book We Were the Mulvaneys by Joyce Carol Oates, have seen this mistake before.

Rating:
Summary: So good I read the whole book in one sitting!
Review: I was a little skeptic at first when I came upon this book. Mainly because I was afraid it would not keep my attention, that perhaps it was more of a teenage girl book. I was wrong! It starts out with a rush and keeps going. The author hooks you from the beginning with the first chapter. Susie is 14, she is raped, murdered and in heaven then begins the story! (Whew)
You relate to everyone in the book from the mother to the young boy who had a crush on Susie to even dwell into the psyche of the murderer himself. I was slightly disappointed in the end with the Susie, Ruth and Ray thing coming together. I felt like I slipped into a bad teen romance book. But what happens in the end with the killer is worth the read.

Rating:
Summary: A touching, poignant story destined to be a classic
Review: I was really touched by this story told by a murdered 14 year old from her venue in heaven. You have to stretch credibility for this premise, but once you get on board, it's a wonderful story. Susie Salmon narrates the story, interspersing the narrative about how she was raped and murdered, the search for her killer accompanied by how her killer is covering his tracks and a description of how her family copes with her loss. We also get a view of what a personalized heaven could be like--- since Susie was killed while in middle school, "her heaven" looks like the high school she never got to attend. She keeps close watch on both her family and the progress to find her killer.

The personal stories here are the stars: her father's desperate attempts to find evidence against the neighbor who he suspects killed Susie and his subsequent medical and mental breakdown, her mother's attempts to keep things going that collapsed completely and caused her to flee to California and her sister's take charge attitude with the baby brother, breaking into the neighbor's house to find evidence and making a life for herself. As you follow the lives of the main characters, you feel a connection with them. There are interesting ideas that spirits are all around us and some people can feel them more than others. Also interesting is the idea that spirits try to make their presence known to loved ones assuring them that they are all right. We also see how Susie gets used to the idea that she is dead, what she misses, and how she yearns for her family. The narrative covers a number of years and brings the story to what I think is a very satifying conclusion with lots of things to think about.

I think it is one of the best books of 2002. I read this as a library book then went out and bought my own personal copy.

Highly recommended.

Rating:
Summary: BOOOOORRRRING!
Review: I hate to admit it - I fell for the hype, having seen this book on display at a bookstore. I guess it goes to show you that it's all in the marketing.

The plot is weak, I have ZERO interest in the characters and have found this to be a long and painful read. What am I missing?

Rating:
Summary: Wow!
Review: Wow, what a book. Ranging from unbelievable sadness, to incredible joy, The Lovely Bones is one that I simply could not put down. I've never had such and unbelievable expirence reading a book. Seabold has outdone herself to every extent!

Rating:
Summary: It Could Have Been Better
Review: Alice Sebold is a fantastic writer. Her prose flows from chapter to chapter. But the storyline becomes a bit farfetched and strays over the final 75 pages. Somehow, I sense that this novel will turn into a Steven Spielberg movie. And that's not a compliment.

Rating:
Summary: The one who is no longer with us
Review: The author of this novel chose a rather difficult subject. Or rather a difficult way of telling a story. The story is actually told by a dead person. Not just any person but a young girl murdered by a neighbour. A man living alone who as it eventually turns out has killed before.

Now, since the story is about someone who is already dead the author may well have chosen to tell us about her afterlife. Instead, we are told more about what happens after her life rather than about her own afterlife.

This is really a story about a family. The family to which this young girl belonged when she was alive and to which she still seems to feel she belongs after her death. It is the story of the remaining members of this family with a different emphasis put on each one of them at various stages of the story. There are also certain parts devoted to other people who were also a part of the young girl's life before her death or rather who could have become a greater part of her life had she remained alive.

So as it turns out this is not really a story about death as such. Nor does it pretend to be so. Really what the author is presenting as with is a story with a different point of view.

The point of view of the one who is no longer with us. And who can no longer be with us.

It seems the story would be interesting in spite of the absence of this different point of view. The reactions of the people in the murder victim's life still maintain our attention of their own accord.

So why have the dead person's point of view?

I suppose it is an element of the novel which makes the novel stand apart from other novels where a similar subject is dealt with. Yet I wonder to what extent this element has actually been used as a device so as to capture as far as possible the imagination of the reader prior to and without as yet even delving further into the details of the story.

Of course there is only one way to find out and that is to actually read the novel. The novel is an easy read as such and one that can take you away from your daily reality since the story is told rather well.

One calming effect induced by this novel is the knowledge that no harm can befall the person telling the story since she is already dead. Even though reading the novel can also create emotions of care for those left behind and their fate. Emotions that tend to mirror the worries of the book's heroine who although dead still cares for the people who mattered to her when she was alive.

One quality not to expect however from this novel is answers to any questions one may have over the afterlife. This does not seem to be the aim of the novel. The link of the story to the death of the storyteller seems really to be aimed solely at the presentation of the story rather than anything else.

In relation to the actual way the novel ends there is an episode contained in the final part of the novel which briefly intertwines the two worlds of death and life together. To refer to this episode in detail would risk ruining the new reader's pleasure in reading the novel. However, this episode does seem to form a rather peculiar and inapt development in the whole plot of the novel creating a new set of expectations for the reader at a point where such expectations quite simply cannot be met.

Rating:
Summary: Beware - This Book Could Reduce You to Tears
Review: The story was told from the perspective of a 14-year old Susie from heaven, after she was brutally murdered by a neighbour. From heaven, she watched the lives of her family and friends on Earth. Each of them had their grieve, pain and loss to cope with, and their lives to move on.

The story was extraordinarily moving and emotive, yet never gloomy. It has the power to reduce the reader to tears.

Rating:
Summary: Just Okay.
Review: I read the book, it was a little painful to finish, because it wasn't going anywhere for me. I expected a different ending and it was ordinary. The book was well written, it came from an unusual point of view and it was an interesting story line, but I didn't find the "special" something that it had to make it a bestseller on all the lists. Susie Salmon was a real 14 year old girl that was experiencing life through the eyes of the world she left behind. It is not a mystery if that is what you are looking for, but it is a good rainy day book for the weekend. Enjoy.