And you know what that means: last blog post of the year! The last few posts have been pretty boring so check out this website of really cool street art! I love the ones where it looks like something/someone is coming out of the ground but it's really just an allusion. I wish I was that creative.
The final summary of the year...
The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold 312-328
Chapter 23 starts with Ray waking up the next morning after he has read Ruth's journal like Susie told him to. While he was reading it, Ruth saw him and said she had a lot to explain. Jack and his family finally leave the hospital and head home, together after many years. Abigail doesn't promise anything because she doesn't want to hurt Jack again, but she says she'll try to make it work this time. Then she goes upstairs and goes into Susie's old room which she hasn't been in for years. She tells Susie she loves her, which makes Susie realize she just needed time away to figure things out. Downstairs, Samuel and Lindsey announce their engagement and they toast to champagne. Ray and his mother bring a pie over and talk about a Victorian house Samuel wants to buy but Ray's father owns it. Susie also realizes now that her family doesn't need to want her anymore and she doesn't need them, but she still will and they will too. The lovely bones, she figures out, aren't the bones in her body, they are the connections between her family while she's been gone.
Now Susie knows that the “lovely bones” are not her body; instead, they are the connections created in her absence between the members of her family and she knows that she can see things now in a way that “lets her hold the world without her in it. The chapter ends with Ruth in the cornfield thinking of the ghost she saw. She will always think of Susie and be haunted and for this Susie feels guilty, but there isn't anything she can do about it. The final chapter, called "Bones," starts with this line: “You don’t notice the dead leaving when they really choose to leave you.” When Grandma Lynn died a few years after the last chapter took place, no one was really affected by the loss, which validates the line. Susie hasn't even seen her in heaven yet. Every now and then Susie sneaks away to look at her family, Sam and Lindsey have been married and live in a house they're renovating. Lindsey is even pregnant. Jack hopes that some day he will build boats with his grand kids which makes him excited but at the same time saddened by this because it will remind him of all the boats he built with Susie. In the end Lindsey has a little girl named Abigail Susanne. Naming her this helps her to move on and let go of the need for her sister Susie. The best part of the ending, however, was Mr. Harvey's death. Susie and her grandfather visit an old diner he remembers and they see Mr. Harvey getting off a greyhound bus. He goes up and starts to talk to a girl who was on the bus. After the girl leaves, and before he can leave, an icicle "accidentally" falls and he jumps forward which makes him fall into a ravine. Because of the snow, no one will find him until it melts. With this, Susie finally feels like she can stop holding on to her old life. In her old neighborhood, they are filling in the sinkholes and a random man finds Susie's charm bracelet. He gives it to his wife and she says that whoever it belonged to is probably all grown up now. In heaven, Susie thinks, "Almost. Not quite."
And that's the end! What a great book. I want to see the movie really badly now, but I'm not sure where I'll find it. Mr. Harvey's death was the perfect end, he finally got what he deserved after killing so many people. It's sad to think that people move on and don't think about people who have died, like Susie's family after her death, but I guess that's what keeps you sane. If they constantly morned over her death, they would be miserable.
Well, I guess this is goodbye!
Maybe I'll keep posting... but no promises.
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