Susie Salmon:
Narrator and main character. A fourteen year old girl from Pennsylvania; who is
beaten, murdered, and raped by her neighbor is the tragic hero in this book. Her
tragic flaws are trust, politeness, and curiosity which ultimately lead to her
death. She provides the audience with information on how her family falls apart
by her death as well as information on her killer Mr. Harvey.
George Harvey: The Salmon family’s neighbor and murderer of Suzie Salmon. His past is revealed after the death of Suzie, she gives the readers information of his broken childhood in order to piece together the way he is now. He was raised to steal by his mother and taught to build like his father, skills to help him set his traps and manipulate his victims. He had murdered several women and children that Suzie eventually meets on her way to heaven.
Abigail Salmon:
Mother of Susie Salmon. After the death of her daughter, she becomes distant
from the family and resents her role as a mother. She leaves the family for a
period of time in order to better deal with her daughter’s death.
Lindsey Salmon: Younger sister of Susie Salmon. She’s considered the athletic and gifted child due to her involvement in soccer and academic achievements. After the death of her sister and her mother leaves, she takes on that mother role. She too steps in and is considered the hero in this book since was brave enough to break into Mr. Harvey’s house and snatch the evidence to prove he’s guilty.
Jack Salmon: Father of Suzie Salmon. Having such a bond with Suzie, he is relentless on finding out who the murderer of his child is. He eventually comes to the conclusion that Mr. Harvey is the one but could not find the evidence to put him away. He gets taunted by his daughter's killer, baseball batted, cheated on, and heart attacked; Mr. Salmon becomes the whipping boy in this tale.
Len Fenerman : The detective that is assigned Suzie’s case. Unable to solve the case, he tries his best efforts to close it but lets the guilty man free based on his “good cop” personality and didn’t want to push Mr. Harvey to respect his civil liberties. Although he too has an affair with Abigail Salmon, he falls in love with her but she just uses him to rid the pain of her daughter’s death.
The Lovely Bones is a novel narrated by fourteen-year old, Susie Salmon. On December 6th, 1973, Susie Salmon decides to take a shortcut home from school through a cornfield, where she is stopped by a man to ask her questions. The man, George Harvey, lures Susie to enter an underground shack he created calling it a “club house” for the children in the neighborhood. Susie thinks she can trust Mr. Harvey because he is a neighbor whom her parents know as well. There, she quickly starts to become uncomfortable and when she tries to leave, Mr. Harvey rapes and murders her. He then dismembers her body into pieces and puts them in a lock, which he later disposes of in a sinkhole. After her death, Susie leaves her body and her spirit ascends to a personal heaven where she could create any environment and watch life on Earth continuing without her. She looks down upon her family’s, friend’s, Mr. Harvey’s, and acquaintances’ lives. However, this causes Susie to become helpless and upset because she does not want to be dead, and is forced to watch as her family tragically grieves her death and her murderer is on the loose. That same night, after Susie’s parents, Abigail and Jack Salmon, realize their daughter is missing, they contact the police who appointed Len Fenerman, to conduct an investigation on Susie’s case. Susie’s parents do not want to believe their daughter is dead, until a hat, blood, and elbow belonging to Susie, is found. It isn’t long until Susie’s death begins to take a huge toll on the family, changing the lives of the Salmon family forever. 
- 1. Why does
Mr. Harvey make the underground hideout in the cornfield?
- 1a. he was stalking Susie so she revealed her route home he had made a trap to capture and kill her.
- 2. Why didn’t
Mr. Harvey bury Susie in what he had built underground?
- 2a. If the police have no body Susie was presumed missing.
- 3. Why
didn’t Mr. Flanagan ask to see what’s inside the safe at the sinkhole?
- 3a. Mr. Harvey was giving trusting answers to his questions and not coming off suspicious of his intentions. Mr. Harvey also says he doesn’t know the combo.
- 4. Was the
elbow that the dog found Susie’s?
- 4a. yes Mr. Harvey was getting sloppy and her whole body was not located in Mr. Harvey’s safe that he disposed of in the sinkhole.
- 5. Why does
Mr. Harvey take the Pennsylvania keystone with initials from the charm
bracelet?
5a. To have a remembrance of the victim he had murdered and that was her piece on the game board symbolizing Susie
- 6. Why does
Susie hang out in a Gazebo while she is in her heaven?
6a. That is where she had planned to meet her crush the day she went missing, she also watches events that happen on earth.
“These were the lovely bones that had grown around my absence: the connections – sometimes tenuous, sometimes made at great cost, but often magnificent – that happen after I was gone. And I began to see things in a way that let me hold the world without me in it. The events that my death wrought were merely the bones of a body that would become whole at some unpredictable time in the future. The price of what I came to see as this miraculous body had been my life” (Sebold 320).
This passage I have chosen was because of the importance to the book as in the first sentence displays the title; it speaks about how Susie can now see the world from a whole new perspective since she is no longer alive. She is still “living” without being present with her family living through those she has left behind. This is important because the audience gets to see Susie experience the afterlife as her heaven and how lovely her life was with the time spent on earth.
The lovely bones are not really bones at all, but a metaphor for the pieces of her that are left over after her passing. These “bones” are the relationships and connections that were formed because of her death and then while those who loved her helped each other heal. For example, a connection grew between Ray and Ruth remaining close to Susie’s family as they grew older and moving forward in their lives as time passes.
“… I could see the difference immediately. There was only one picture in which my mother was Abigail. It was that first one, the one taken of her unawares, the one captured before the click startled her into the mother of the birthday girl, owner of the happy dog, wife to the loving man, and mother again to another girl and a cherished boy. Homemaker. Gardener. Sunny neighbor. My mother’s eyes were oceans, and inside them there was loss. I thought I had my whole life to understand them, but that was the only day I had. Once upon Earth I saw her as Abigail, and then I let it slip effortlessly back – my fascination held in check by wanting her to be that mother and envelop me as that mother” (Sebold 43).
This passage shows the authors writing style as not being overly descriptive but paints a story with enough detail for readers to understand. The author uses a metaphors and short sentences throughout the novel. For example, in the passage Sebold had written in this passage, “My mother’s eyes were oceans, and inside them there was loss” or “Homemaker. Gardener. Sunny neighbor.”This passages explains feeling and emotions as Susie’s describing her mother only seeing her true self unaware of being photographed, it is emotional and heartfelt as Susie’s describing the feelings of no longer able to be there and interact physically with her mother.
In the book “The Lovely Bones,” a little girl named Susie Salmon was viciously raped and killed by George Harvey, a serial killer and a pedophile who have had murdered several other young women including Susie. The timeline of this story is from 1973 to early 1980s. At that period of time, those type of violent crime wasn’t common in the society. So Susie didn’t suspect Mr. Harvey as a bad person. Susie probably didn’t expect this to happen at all because child related violent crimes at that time were not usual compare to current society. Predators like Mr.Harvey would not have gotten away with it if it had happened in today’s society thanks to cutting edge scientific investigations and other high technology gadgets that help finding evidence. While reading the book, I was a little frustrated because of the fact that how easy it was for Mr.Harvey to lure Susie to his dugout and commit a crime. For example, If only Susie had cellphone back in the day and called her parents before she enters the dugout, or if there was a surveillance camera, I am sure it could have been prevented.
From my point of view, it looked very painful to see Jack Salmon losing his precious daughter to a serial killer and ended up not finding him. I lost my grandfather too whom I loved so much and couldn’t deal with the grief for a long period of time. In the book “The Lovely Bones,” Susie’s family was unable to get back to their normal life because of the aftermath of tragic incident. However, they eventually decided to move on after awhile and chose to live aIn the book “The Lovely Bones,” a little girl named Susie Salmon was viciously raped and killed by George Harvey, a serial killer and a pedophile who have had murdered several other young women including Susie. The timeline of this story is from 1973 to early 1980s. At that period of time, those type of violent crime wasn’t common in the society. So Susie didn’t suspect Mr. Harvey as a bad person. Susie probably didn’t expect this to happen at all because child related violent crimes at that time were not usual compare to current society. Predators like Mr.Harvey would not have gotten away with it if it had happened in today’s society thanks to cutting edge scientific investigations and other high technology gadgets that help finding evidence. While reading the book, I was a little frustrated because of the fact that how easy it was for Mr.Harvey to lure Susie to his dugout and commit a crime. For example, If only Susie had cellphone back in the day and called her parents before she enters the dugout, or if there was a surveillance camera, I am sure it could have been prevented. From my point of view, it looked very painful to see Jack Salmon losing his precious daughter to a serial killer and ended up not finding him. I lost my grandfather too whom I loved so much and couldn’t deal with the grief for a long period of time. In the book “The Lovely Bones,” Susie’s family was unable to get back to their normal life because of the aftermath of tragic incident. However, they eventually decided to move on after awhile and chose to live a happy life despite of Susie's death. After watching their family moving on, Susie decides to move on as well from in between to a larger heaven so she can finally settle down and find the peace. I was in a similar situation when i lost my grandfather and eventually realized that I should go back to my normal life because that would make him happy as well, hopefully in heaven.
