D.A.

Author’s Note: I wrote this piece to represent Main Idea/ theme. The whole theme idea of this is Loss of Family.  In the story The Lovely Bones, the Salmon family just lost their daughter Susie. The family is not taking it well at all. At the mention of Susie’s name, the mother chokes up.

 Her mother kept calling her through this whole awful event. She kept saying: “We’re having string beans and lamb; your brother has a new finger painting, and I made apple crumb cake.” But Susie couldn’t say a word; she was just stuck under the dead weight of Mr. Harvey.  “He took the hat from my mouth. Tell me you love me he said. Gently I did. The end came anyway.” Susie tells us this right before the 2nd chapter which leads us to when she is in heaven after her brutal murder/rape.

The Salmon family had to stick together a few days after Susie didn’t come home. They found her elbow and only her elbow. The rest of her body was in a cloth bag shoved in a safe at the bottom of a sink hole. This story is really emphasizes the meaning of family before Susie died. Her dad and her use to make ships inside the bottle. She would hold the bottle for him and he would carefully place every little piece just how he wanted. No one else likes to help the Father besides Susie since they thought it was boring but she stated that she liked it, fascinated by it actually.

 When Susie was up in heaven, she could look down and see what people were doing. She saw that her Father smashed all the ships; she saw her brother confused as to why she wasn’t home. She knew he didn’t understand the concept of death and the family knew it would kill him if he knew. While watching the dad and the brother, she saw her mom crying when no one was around, her sister taking the blame and going down the wrong path to try to get over the loss.

While she waited and watched her family mourn over her, she watched Mr. Harvey. She prayed for the day he was caught. She questioned why he wasn’t as careful, I mean, a cloth bad for a dripping corpse, overnight wouldn’t it seep through? “He was so calm like he’s done this before” Susie thought to herself. What if he has done this before?

In conclusion to this, I mean, you have to have courage to move on after a loss. You need supportive, caring, and loving people around you. Susie’s sister was sent to talk to the guidance counselor but she refused to talk. She acted like nothing even happened but if you knew what she was thinking; you would know she is dying inside.