lovely bones
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i am absolutetly amazed that this fantastic book, has not yet made it ro a film. or perhaps it has. correct me if i'm wrong. won't go on, because the previous reviews say it all.
kevin p dean
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A lot of money for ten pages
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The first ten pages of this novel are gripping stuff - well-voiced and full of drama. Gradually thereafter it descends into the most stultifying, Derek-Aconah-like drivel. I blushed with embarrassment reading some of the later episodes and the concluding present of a drum kit and everyone thrilled to bits with life going on is the most fearful cop-out tosh imaginable. If there are spirits up there looking down, lets hope their insights intothe universe aren't this trite. Ghastly.
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Sad, beautiful, haunting, uplifting and an outstanding debut
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One of the best novels of the year surely (I read it in 2003) - and one that should be read by MEN as well as women! I notice that (as I write this) few of the reviews appear to have been submitted by men. This isn't a girlie book, no way. This deals with one of the most horrific of experiences and, sadly, it's the kind of thing we see on the news all the time : violent sexual assault. Of course this book is a work of fiction, but its theme is a very real issue and one that all of us need to take more seriously. Not the afterlife, but what (in this case) brought it about in the first place.
This is apparently Alice Sebold's first novel and what a special one it is. So moving was it that I often wondered if the author had suffered (in real life) as the fictional Susie's parents do.
One of the scary messages left in the mind after reading The Lovely Bones is that there's possibly a George Harvey near you right now, maybe he lives in your street, or, worse, he lives across the road from your daughter. He seems such a nice man, doesn't he? Be vigilant, please.
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Amazing -
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This is one of my top 10 books ever. A really great read i could not put it down.
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insipid fiction
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How did this author manage to make rape and murder seem so cosy and unobstrusive as to have readers find this book 'comforting'?
I have read "Lucky" her real-life memoir and find it all the stranger that Alice Sebold wrote a novel where the vile actions and consequences of one man seem so diminished by tone. A friend gave me this book several months after I had been raped, and although I may not have been able to be particularly rational then, I have read it since...and realised why people love this book...you can view violent crime through soft-focus and take the brutality and unpleasantness from it with this vaguely whimisical writing.
This is a novel for people who don't want to open their eyes to the pain and horror of violent crime, but try to pretend such events don't invade the lives of those who suffer it, their families and society itself.
The second time I read this to see if I was judging it too harshly, I kept thinking its the kind of novel people who cry at wildlife programmes love...if you actually feel like being challenged and takend outside your comfort zone, do try 'Lucky'
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