The Lovely Bones
By Alice Sebold
Little, Brown and Company, 2002
Hardcover, 328 pages
ISBN# 0-316-66634-3
$21.95
By Anika Logan
What would life be like in the here after for a fourteen-year-girl whose life was senselessly cut short? What would it be like for her to spend her time watching the
world she left behind, before she was ready to? Welcome to the world of Susie Salmon.
At the opening of Alice Sebold’s stunning debut novel, Susie Salomon tells us that she is dead. Her life was ended on December 6, 1973 by a perverted neighbor. The book goes back and forth between Susie’s narrative, both her attempts to make sense of her new world, Heaven, and also her observations as she
watches her family and friends attempt to cope with her violent and untimely death, and the events that are actually happening on Earth to the people she loves.
The scene of her murder is powerful and shocking but what’s most amazing is that Susie is not bitter about what has happened to her. There is an air of hopefulness and compassion in the telling of her story that brings tears to the eyes. Susie watches closely as the days after her murder turn to weeks and months. She watches as her family attempts to come to grips with their tragic loss and the hole it has left in the family. She sees it all- her mother’s pulling away from the family; her father’s quest to find her killer and make the person pay; her younger sister’s fears for her future and feelings that mirror her father’s and her baby brother’s tears of confusion about where big sister Susie has gone.
Susie discovers a Heaven where there is much beauty, happiness and many friends. The dreams she had on Earth she gets to live in Heaven. But she also comes to learn that there are boundaries as well and those boundaries allow her to go only so far in her new home. She is taught that she will not be able to explore Heaven any further until she is willing to let go of Earth and all the people in it. This takes time for Susie and does not prove to be an easy feat.
This book deals with one of life’s most harshest tragedies- losing a loved one to a violent crime- but it also carries with it a message of love, joy and the courage it takes to allow healing to begin. The Lovely Bones drew me in from the very beginning and held on to the very end. It is a definite must read for everyone. Alice Sebold’s ideas of Heaven are very enticing and her prose is eloquent. This book will remain with you long after you close the back cover.
* Note- This is writer Alice Sebold’s first work of fiction but not her first book. In 1999, Scribner published her first book, “Lucky.” Not for the faint of heart, Lucky is the writer’s account of a rape- her own.