The Lovely Bones Annotation

Sebold, Alice. The Lovely Bones. Boston: Little Brown and, 2002. Print. (328 Pages)

                The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold was yet another new reading experience and differed from some the the books I have previously read. My previously read books centered on deep and moving concepts. For instance The Help was about the struggles of African American maids facing discrimination during the 1960s and A Thousand Splendid Suns was centered on a woman’s struggles. I hate to say that The Lovely Bones had a “lighter” theme because there were very deep parts, but the overall theme did not have as great of an impact than some of the other books.

The Lovely Bones was also an entirely new and interesting concept; a murder mystery written by the victim that was trying to help her family discover the killer for themselves. I think that this was a brilliant writing approach taken by the author. It set the book apart from the others and gave readers a fresh perspective on murder mysteries.

The author developed the characters with such depth and different personalities that it elevated the status of the book in my opinion. I felt myself becoming attached to the lives of Susie’s family because she cared so deeply about them. The book obviously included the aftermath of the murder which caused me, as a reader, to feel the emotions of the family and understand their actions.

I think that the book was fantastic. I have never read any “thrilling” books before. I figured that because the author disclosed the facts of the murder in the very beginning of the book there would be no suspense and that it would be a bit boring but I was proved completely wrong. I was on the “edge of my chair” for the majority of this book and found myself reading it for hours on end. (317)