Book Blog Post #4 - The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold

The Lovely Bones

The Lovely Bones is a chilling novel written by Alice Sebold. The plot line is about a 14 year old girl who was murdered, and she is telling what she is seeing while she is in Heaven. When we first meet Suzy Salmon, the protagonist, she is already in Heaven. Then it jumps to the days right before she was murdered, and then she is telling everything she sees watching the world continue on from Heaven. This novel takes place in an unnamed Pennsylvanian suburb, spanning from the 1970s' roughly into the 1980s'. The main characters are Suzy Salmon, her general family (sister Lindsey, brother Buckley, mom, dad, etc.) and a boy named Ray, and a girl named Ruth. Ray was Suzy's boyfriend for the brief days in the beginning of the story. Ruth was just a girl at Suzy's school who said she felt Suzy fly past her when she was traveling into Heaven. Ruth was walking through the school parking lot after school towards the cornfield near their school, which was where Suzy was murdered. She then saw a shadow flying towards her and she said it touched her face. No one believed her except for Ray.  The general conflict of this book is really just her whole family coping with her death and trying to find her murderer. Lindsey, her sister, broke into her murderer's house to try and find clues because she had a suspicion that he murdered Suzy. This book a thrilling page turner with more adventure or sadness around every corner.

Connections 

I could definately connect this book to Go Ask Alice and other books along that series or diaries. I feel that they all had relateable themes to eachother such as grief and a small bit of good versus evil. Although there isn't much grief in the Go Ask Alice books except at the end, I connected the grief to missing your life and what's ahead for your future. Suzy dies and the girl in the other books throws her life away with drugs or alcohol. I also connected good versus evil because in The Lovely Bones, it's Suzy's family fighting against the heartbreak and tearing apart this man has caused their family. In Go Ask Alice, she is fighting against herself with the evil problem of addiction. I think that all throughout the book they can connect themes, there isn't one specific part that connects the two.

All in all, The Lovely Bones was such an amazing read. In some parts, it was really sad for me at least. It can be a challenging read trying to keep up with who is narrating the story because it tends to change throughout the story. But I definatly recommened this book if you are up for a challenge.