‘The Lovely Bones’ (‘Nostalgia anioła’) – a book review

Magdalena Jagielska – absolwentka Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego, nauczyciel języka angielskiego od 11 lat, od lat 9 lektor w ŚCJO.

Are you looking for a good book to read? Do you like ambitious, exciting, and, at the same time, moving novels? If so, you must read ‘The Lovely Bones’ by Alice Sebold. The author of the book is a contemporary American writer who started her writing career at the age of 36. ‘The Lovely Bones’ is her second book and the one which gained her worldwide popularity. It is an exceptional novel about life and death, joy and sorrow, forgiveness and revenge. It is also the story about love, healing your soul and forgetting.

‘The Lovely Bones’ is a mixture of crime story and drama. It revolves around the rape and murder of a fourteen-year-old Susie Salmon, who lives with her family on the outskirts of Philadelphia. However, the book is not a typical whodunnit in which you follow detectives trying to solve some mystery or crime. The real aim of the author is to show what effect Susie’s death has had on her family and friends and their attempts to cope with her disappearance.

The novel has a first-person narrator which means that the story is told by Susie herself. She talks to readers from heaven where she can watch what happens on earth. She sees her family and friends who first try not to lose hope that Susie will be found safe and sound and then struggle to come to terms with her loss. She watches her murderer, who turns out to be a serial rapist, attempting to cover his tracks and the police conducting the investigation. She even helps to solve the mystery of her death and comforts her nearest and dearest by appearing on earth as a ghost!

I will not say anything more in order not to spoil the reading for you. What I can add is that ‘The Lovely Bones’ is a clever and gripping novel with interesting characters and unexpected twists and turns of the story. If you have not read it yet, you had better hurry to your local bookshop or library. This book is certainly worth reading!

The lovely bones
Autor: Alice Sebold
Wydawca: Macmillan Publishers
Data Wydania: 2003
Liczba stron: 328
Język: angielski
ISBN: 0330413163