Customer Reviews

The Lovely Bones (Reader's Companion)

5 star:		(3)
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3 star:		(1)
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The story of Susie Salmon starts out with the description of her death and a killer still at large. As she watches from heaven the reactions and healings of her family, friends, nieghbors, and an unsuspecting girl she passed on her way to a new world, you start feel as if you are watching youself. You will become so involved with the pain of Susie's family as well as begin to wonder about the heaven you may see someday. What will it be like and will it be what you imagine today? I could not put this book down. And will be worth the time to read it again.

This novel opened with a murder being committed... with the murderer getting away with the crime. But it's just the beginning to a long (8 yrs.) healing process for a girl named Susie (whose bones have been literally broken), her family (who suffered from broken familial ties after her death) & some friends/relatives/neighbors (who are involved with the Salmon family & affected by their sufferings). Like bones, they are all connected with one another, with Susie serving as 'joints' to hold them together. Like limbs, each character moves independently, only to realize later on that his/her actions is part of a bigger body. Like a disease, grief rots the bones & destroys its connectivity. But like blood, love washes over them, brings hope & heals. Susie, Lindsey, Buck, Jack, Abbie --- broken in their own way --- healed by time & love for one another --- lovely.

This book promises a message of hope after an obscene crime is committed. The descriptions of the crime hit you at the beginning of the book, and as the mother of a young daughter, they haunt me vividly a month later. But the subsequent descriptions of "heaven" are not overly comforting or hopeful, nor do they provide any particular insight or conclusion. The other characters in the book were not overly compelling to me, and of course there's no justice in the end for the criminal. Finally, the resolution that the main character receives does not appear to me to be something worthy of supernatural feats.

Don't get me wrong, I couldn't put this book down once I started it, but I just don't know if I'm glad I read it.

I thought this was one of the best books that I have ever read! I really enjoyed this book because it was so different. I never put this book down. I would read it again and again. This book is amazing and touching.