The Lovely Bones, Alice Sebold

I made it my goal to finish this book today; because I knew it was going to disturb me and I didn't really want to prolong the experience.

I was right, too, by the way.

The first thing you have to put aside when you start this book is theology, if you care, which I do. The portrayal of heaven really bothered me at first because it was so based on the individual. But then I remembered this was a work of fiction and it didn't need to conform to reality; God, as I recall, is never mentioned in this entire work of human pain, difficult situations, growing up and letting go.

I'm not prepared to say that it was a bad book, because it wasn't. The characters were really well done. The narration, from the point of a murdered fourteen year old girl, sounded right.

It reminded me of Night Road, in a way, by Kristin Hannah.

I can't understand the depth of pain that encompasses the loss of a child, to violence or otherwise, so I have a really hard time understanding all of the differing reactions. I can only imagine how I would respond to that kind of a tragedy - and I would hope for myself that I would have both of my arms wrapped around God's knees and trusting Him - His plan. So when a story is told about this kind of grief, and God is left out of the picture, I can't understand it.

However. The book was well-written, if incredibly disturbing. I now need to go listen to something else to get parts of it out of my head. But I liked the ending. By the way.