The Lovely Bones

The Lovely Bones (2002) by Alice Sebold. This book grabs you by the heartstrings at the very beginning and never lets go. We learn in the first paragraph that Susie Salmon, age 14, was murdered on Dec. 6, 1973. But the story is told in the first person, from Susie's point of view. After she is killed, she goes straight to heaven, and becomes a kind of omniscient narrator -- living in her heaven, where some of her fondest wishes come true, but still looking down with longing on earth, where her family and friends are coping as best they can with her disappearance. It's not only a uniquely original idea for a book, it's a beautifully written story that weaves together the many lives which are touched by one 14-year-old girl. By the way, I've seen the movie that they made from the book, and they really didn't capture the essence of the book in the film. There are compromises, inevitably, in converting a book to a movie, but in this case the filmmakers just about totally missed the boat. The book gets a Grade: A