Diversity of Grieving: The Lovely Bones

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over her daughter’s death. She can’t deal with the guilt and pain anymore so she moves to California to get away from the situation.

Unlike her mother, Susie’s younger sister, Lindsey, does not change her life much at all to cope with her grief. Lindsey goes back to school shortly after her sister is murdered. When she goes returns, the principal calls her into his office because he wants her to know that the school is very sorry for her loss. She seems to not appreciate his kindness especially when he mentions her joining the soccer team: “I’d say it would be pretty hard to play soccer on the soccer field when its approximately 20 feet from where my sister was supposedly murdered” (Sebold 33). This shows that she is very blunt about talking about Susie’s death and does not care to be straight forward with it. She is grieving with the sadness and obviously doesn’t want to let anybody try and help, until she meets Samuel. They start dating and she allows him to help her with her emotions about her sister. They stay together through the book and he evens asks Lindsey to marry him. Jack likes Samuel for being there for his only living daughter when he couldn’t: “My father was soft in his trust with Samuel- years had gone by when the boy had done nothing but right to his surviving daughter” (Sebold 231). Samuel helps to open up and face her sisters death. Growing up after her mother left, Lindsey becomes protective of her father and takes care of him and her younger brother Buckley. She helps the family out no matter how much she is still dealing with Susie’s death.

Buckley, Susie’s little brother, doesn’t grieve as much as the rest of the members of his family because he was too young to understand her death. Though he does see Susie after she is dead when he is young and tells his friend Nate about it: “Last night she came in and kissed me on the cheek” (Sebold 92). He still remembers Susie and realizes that she may not be seen but that she is still there. Although he was young when her murder happened he remembers and grieves their memories together. Like when she saved his life before she was dead, when he choked on a twig. What makes Buckley grieve the most though is watching his father be so sick and depressed. To deal with his emotions him, Samuel and Sam’s brother, Hal build Buckley a fort: “Hal and Nate and Holiday were the only ones Buckley had ever allowed in his fort” (Sebold 228). He liked to be alone in his fort when he was thinking about his dad and Susie. It gave him comfort when he was upset. Though it’s still hard for him to understand why his father is so depressed, and it upsets him that their father-son bond is broken.

Overall, The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold shows how each member of the Salmon family takes Susie’s death their own way. They were torn apart but by the end, they find their way back to a being a family. Jack isn’t sick anymore, Abigail moves back to her family, Lindsey is happy with Samuel and Buckley is just glad to have his family back together again. In Heaven, this gives Susie the comfort she needs to know that her family isn’t grieving anymore. It allows Susie to stop worrying about what is happening on earth go to her heaven and not the in between.