Independent Reading Log #5

10/30/12

The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold

Pages 209-328 (the end of book)

1. Summary of what I read:  In this final passage of The Lovely Bones a lot of things occur. Abigail, Susie’s mom, leaves the family and moves to California leaving Jack to take care of everything. After this happens, Susie’s grandma comes to stay and help out at the house. She ends up helping a lot and they all take it as a blessing that she is there. Jack is still holding onto Susie which compromises his relationship with Buckley, Susie’s younger brother. When Buckley finally confronts his father about their relationship, Jack gets so worked up that he has a heart attack. Abigail gets the news in California and decides that she needs to come home and check on Jack since it is so serious. She has been gone for so long that she has ruined her relationship with Buckley almost completely and her relationship with Lindsey is extremely severed. Though her relationships with her children aren't in any way the same as they were, when she sees Jack again it is very similar to the way it use to be. While Abigail was gone Jack fell in love with her all over again and he is extremely happy when she comes back. Also in this passage, Lindsey has graduated from college and her high school sweetheart and her end up getting engaged. Susie looks down on this relationship and longs for her could-have-been relationship with Ray. After this and extraordinary thing happens and Susie actually comes back down to Earth. It is almost as if she trades places with Ruth and finally gets to live out her fantasy with Ray. Ray has always felt her beside him and when this transition occurs he recognizes her in Ruth’s body. They both cherish this time together and are sad to see it come to an end. In the final pages of the book, it describes Mr. Harvey’s death. He was just about to murder another girl when an icicle fell from a roof and kills him. After this and the fact that Susie’s family has reunited, the book tells of how Susie’s family has final come to turns with her passing and has begun to move on. They will never forget her but they are now allowing themselves to be happy again and move on together.

2. Important quote from the text: “They kept sharing when they felt me. Being together, thinking and talking about the dead, became a perfectly normal part of their life” (Sebold 324-325). I think that this is an important quote because it shows how Susie’s family finally is able to move on after her passing. Until this point in the book, they all are having a really hard time coming to terms with her death. They all had slightly moved on, but they all still held onto her so much that they couldn’t move on with their daily lives. This quote is after the family has been reconnected and it tells of how they are slowly allowing themselves to move on finally and heal.

3. Connections to the text: When Abigail came home from California to see Jack when he was in the hospital, she was not welcomed by her children at all. I can understand why the children would act that way. Abigail left them at the time when they needed her most and missed more than half a decade of their lives. I’m sure that Lindsey and Buckley were feeling extremely hurt and unwanted. I can understand what the children were feeling and I don’t think that the mom deserved to be treated by them any better.

Independent Reading Log #4

10/26/12

The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold

Pages 113-208

1. Summary of what I read: In the beginning of this passage, Susie tells about her sister Lindsey’s time at a summer camp title the Gifted Symposium. Samuel, Lindsey’s boyfriend also goes and Susie watches as their relationship evolves. This is one place where Lindsey is not known as the sister to the girl who was horribly murdered and she is extremely grateful for it. She thoroughly enjoys her time there until it is time for the final project. The project is to plan the perfect murder and Lindsey can hardly believe it. When she returns home her family still acts the same as when she left. She can feel her mom drifting away. Her mom has started an affair with the chief detective working on her daughter’s case, Len Fenerman. Jack still believes that Mr. Harvey has killed his daughter and one night this thought gets the best of him. He wanders out into the cornfield following a little light he saw out his window. Suspecting that this is Mr. Harvey he brings a bat and ends up attacking a girl named Clarissa who was out just meeting her boyfriend. This act only pushes the mom further away from Jack.

2. Important quote from the text: “Our heartache poured into one another like water from cup to cup. Each time I told my story, I lost a bit, the smallest drop of pain” (Sebold, 186). I think that this is an important quote because it tells of the first time that Susie meets the other girls who have been killed by Mr. Harvey. She knew that there were others and she had an idea of what he did to them, but she had never seen them in real life, or in the “Inbetween.” The "Inbetween" is where she is stuck in right now. It is in between Heaven and Earth. I am imagining that she was beginning to feel extremely alone and irritated that no one was getting any closer to catching Mr. Harvey. She went through something truly horrible and to be able to talk about it with other people who could really understand almost exactly what she went through must have just been a huge weight lifted off her shoulders. They could relate to and understand exactly what she went through and was still going through.

3. Connections to the text: In this passage I really felt sympathy for the Salmon family. As expected, they are having a hard time coping with the loss of Susie and it is tearing their family apart. Susie’s mother is drifting away from their family and the remaining children are becoming more dependent on their father. Jack still really believes that Mr. Harvey has murdered Susie, but her mom agrees with the police and thinks that Jack is going too far with the whole thing. They are not the madly in love couple that they use to be and Susie’s mom knows that and finds comfort in Len. I’d like to believe that in a situation like this one, parents would find a way to stick together and work through it while still keeping their love and appreciation for each other alive. But sadly, I know that is not really the way it usually goes. I wish that they didn't have to lose their marriage especially since they had already lost their daughter in such a horrible way.

Independent Reading Log #3

10/22/12

The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold

Pages 54-112

1    1.      Summary of what I read: In this passage Susie is, of course, still up in heaven looking down on her family as they cope. Susie tells us of her connection with Ruth in the months previous of her death. At school, Ruth was a misunderstood individual and Susie related with and sympathized for her. After her death, Susie tells of how Ruth and her first kiss Ray Singh become united as friends because of the common interest of Susie. Also in this passage, Jack, Susie’s dad, becomes suspicious of Mr. Harvey. Mr. Harvey is in fact the murderer and Jack has a feeling that he is, but there is nothing to tie him to it except for Jack’s gut feeling. The time has also come for Susie’s memorial service. Her grandmother comes in from out of town and helps the family feel a little bit more normal again. Though the ache of loss is still in all of the family, the grandma helps take a little bit of the burden off even if only for a little while.

2    2.      Important quote from the text: “During the final hymn, as my family stood, she leaned over to Lindsey and whispered, ‘By the door, that’s him’” (Sebold, 112). I think that this is an important quote because it states the first time that Lindsey recognizes Mr. Harvey as her sister’s murderer. It is at Susie’s memorial service and her grandmother points him out to her. Of course, there is no factual evidence that he is the murderer but Jack believes so and that is what the grandma and Lindsey are going off of. Before this, Lindsey had no one in particular who she thought had committed the crime, but now she had her father’s gut feeling and that was good enough for her.

3    3.      Connections to the text: Once again I do not feel an especially strong connection to this text. A great deal of this passage talks about the way the different members of the family cope with their loss of Susie and how broken their family is becoming. This has never happened to my family so I do not really know exactly how they feel. Buckley, the youngest child in the family, has just been told about Susie’s death and now believes that he sees her sometimes. I thought that part was really nice because I like to believe that when someone little, such as Buckley, goes through something so traumatic there is someone there to help him along. Susie is there and I think that helps him through the grieving process in a healthier way than the rest of the family. 

Horror Story Review

1. When I was writing my story I was inspired by a thing that actually occurs in reality more often than I think most people realize. Multiple Personality Disorder is a real disease that I was first introduced to when I was watching Criminal Minds. Criminal Minds is a television show in which many of the episodes are actually based on real occurrences. They solve murders and find the criminals by profiling them based on the crimes that he has committed. In a certain episode the killer was a victim of Multiple Personality Disorder. This episode really freaked me out because I thought that it was really crazy how someone could snap back and forth into different personalities but while still in the same body. So, from watching this episode I kinda got an insight to the disease and I tried to portray it in the scariest way possible in my story.
2. I found that the middle of the story was most easy to complete. I thought this because once I had my beginning and I knew how to end it, the middle was easy and actually fun to write. I knew where my story was going and could start getting really creative and fun with it.
3. I found that the beginning was most difficult to complete. I had a really hard time coming up with a story line that I was interested in enough to spend two weeks writing on. I wanted a good story line because I knew that if it was uninteresting and lame no one would want to read it and I wouldn't have a fun time writing it.
4. On a scale from 1-10 I believe I am around an 8 or 9 with the final product of my story.I feel this way because even though I got a late start writing it because of the fact that I couldn't decide what to write on, I worked on it a lot and tried very hard to make it good. I feel like my story is good, but like always I felt like if I had a little more time or used my time more wisely in the beginning I could have made it better.
5. I feel like I deserve an A or A- on this story. I tried hard and took a lot of time writing it and trying to make it as interesting and scary as possible. I had fun with writing it and I hope that that energy reflects in the story.
6. On my next writing project, I will figure out an idea earlier. I am a little bit of a procrastinator and it never pays off in the end because I always end up feeling rushed. Next time I will get down to business earlier which will allow me to spend more time on finishing the story and making it better.

Independent Reding Log #2

10/10/2012

The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold

Pages 31-53

11.)    Summary of what I read: As previously established, Susie Salmon has been murdered and now is watching down from heaven as the events following her murder unfold. She watches her family deals with the grief of her passing. She also tells of how as she was leaving her life on earth she accidentally touches a girl named Ruth. Susie is already dead, but as she passes from Earth to Heaven she manages to brush her. She leaves her mark on Ruth, and Susie watches as Ruth’s life unfolds and changes as she deals with what Susie has inflicted on her. In these pages, Susie also describes her eleventh birthday and how she got a camera as her present from her parents. It was her dream to become a wildlife photographer and she describes how much she loved and appreciated her camera.

22.)    Important quote from the text:  “He would find his Susie now inside his young son. Give that love to the living. He told himself this – spoke it aloud inside his brain – but my presence was like a tug on him, it dragged him back back back” (Sebold, 48). When Susie says this she is referring to the “he” as her father and I think that this is an important quote because it describes the slight brokenness of the family now that Susie is gone. Because of Susie’s death her father will always look at his son and see part of Susie and become sad and burdened by the grief of her passing. He will always love Susie immensely and he knows that he needs to give that love to his son, but Susie will always be there in his mind and he will always hold onto her.  

33.)    Connections to the text: Once again I do not feel a very strong connection to this text. I have never lost a child or a sister and because of that it is very hard for me to fully understand what the family in this story is going through. I can imagine, but until I have lost someone so dear to me I don’t think that I can truly understand the pain and suffering that it creates.

Somebody Else’s Body

            When I woke up this morning I was Abraham Lincoln! I couldn’t believe it. He was always the president I most admired and I always wondered what a day in his shoes would be like. During his presidency he had an immense amount of weight on his shoulders. With the civil war brewing and possibly splitting the United States in half, he had a lot to deal with. I always wanted to know how he did it, and now I could. I was in the White House! Holy cow, it was beautiful! Fancier than anything I had ever experienced. The minute I woke up and left my room I was surrounded by people who had so many questions about so many different things. I was rudely awakened to the sad realization of what was happening to the United States of America. There was so much pressure, especially with me knowing what the outcome was suppose to be, I needed to make sure that I created such an outcome. One of my assistants stated that today I was going to visit the troops. Before I knew it, I was out the door and on my way. I got there and was immediately humbled beyond belief. These men were fighting so hard, risking their lives for something that I had actually experienced. I spent most of my day there. We told stories and jokes. These men who had experienced one another dying for the sake of their country were so inspiring. Instead of being depressed they tried to focus on the good. They were so happy that I, meaning the President, came to visit them. The day flew by and after I left, I went straight to bed. I was emotionally drained and could not keep my eyes open. I felt bad being so tired and couldn’t even imagine how tired the troops were and though my body was at rest my mind never was. It finally fully sunk in how much President Abraham Lincoln actually had to deal with, and it made me rethink how big my problems back home actually were. The next thing I knew I was awake and back in my old body. My little trip back in time, whether it was just a dream or something real, was the best gift I was ever given from an unknown source. It had taught me so much and I would never forget it or take the freedoms that those soldiers had provided for me for  granted again.

Independent Reading Log #1

10/7/2012

      The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold

      Pages 1-30

11.)    Summary of what I read: The book begins with a description of the main character Susie Salmon. It promptly states that she was murdered and describes how it happened. She was walking home from school one day and decided to take a shortcut through the field. She stumbled upon her neighbor Mr. Harvey. They conversed about how he made a fort in the earth for kids to play in. Then, Mr. Harvey brings her down into the fort in which has no exit except for the way they came. Mr. Harvey does not let her go and ends up horribly raping her and murdering her violently. She wakes up in heaven and continues to describe her life there. Anything can happen there if you wish it hard enough and have a good reason for it. Anything except Susie’s biggest desire of her being alive and Mr. Harvey dead. So instead, she decides to watch down on her family has they receive the heartbreaking news of her death.

22.)    Important quote from the text: “I could not have what I wanted most: Mr. Harvey dead and me living. Heaven wasn't perfect. But I came to believe that if I watched closely, and desired, I might change the lives of those I loved on Earth” (Sebold, 20). I thought that this quote was important because it shows what Susie desires to do in the upcoming chapters. Obviously she wants to be alive and living her life with her friends and family but she knows that she cannot do that anymore. No matter how hard she tries and wishes it will never come true. Though she still grasps onto the hope that someday she will reenter her life on Earth she wants to help her family that is still living unfold what has happened to her and discover her perpetrator.

33.)    Connections to the text: Personally, I haven’t connected with this text very much so far. I have never been in such a horrible situation as Susie has and I hope that I never will be. In a way, I do understand her longing to be somewhere else even though she is unable to be there. She wants to be home with her family and I have experienced that as well. I have not experienced it to that degree, but I understand her longing to be in her own sheltered and safe environment. So far, this book has reminded me about the dangers of strangers or even people that you know somewhat but not very well. Some people are capable of harsher things than we can even imagine and I always need to remember that before I put myself into a bad situation. 

Scary Story

            Clink, clink, clink, her milk bottles went as she carried them through the town. Every day at the same time Luis would drop off all the ordered milk to the people of the Holind Island. She was thirteen years old and considering the circumstances was the sweetest girl in town. She was innocent, kind, and loved her job of delivering the milk. It had been her job ever since her sister had mysteriously disappeared three years previously, passing unto her the role. When she was ten years old, her sister Joy disappeared. She was a kind girl just like Luis and out of the blue she disappeared. It was the biggest news Holind had heard of in years.  There was no real evidence of who did it or where she went but with Holind being a small town, everyone had someone to blame. Time passed and people moved on but Luis never moved on. She never forgot and never stopped looking for who she thought took her sister. She knew that her sister wouldn’t leave on purpose. Joy loved her home and her family. There was one man that Luis thought maybe would have done it, but she had no reason as to why he would do it. He was an older man of about 59 years of age and he never seemed to socialize with anybody. Luis had noticed Joy’s fascination with him the months prior to her disappearance. Joy would talk to Luis about him. How he was such an odd man and always seemed mad about something. He always gave Luis the creeps but Joy could never get enough of him. She would go spy on him every day after school to try and figure out what event had made him so mad. The day that Joy had disappeared had been a dreadfully rainy day. It was thundering, lightning, and was a torrential downpour. Luis begged Joy to not go to the old man’s house that day but she would not listen. She did not listen and because of that never returned home that day. Luis tried for months and months after that to find her sister, but she never did. But everyday she could feel herself getting closer and closer to her sister’s perpetrator. One day when Luis was walking home from school she decided to take the path that her sister always took. This path gave her a bad felling but she pushed herself along.  On one of the trees along the path she discovered a marking that looked as if in her sister’s handwriting. Then, she saw another one, and another one. She followed this path, never looking as to where she was going until she found herself right in front of his house. As soon as she realized this, she panicked and tripped over her own shoes; her mind moving faster than her feet could. As she was getting up she looked at the house and found that the man was staring at her through the upstairs winder. She looked once more and he was gone. Where could he have gone in such a short time? She scrambled to her feet and started running. But she did not get very far, for there the old man waited for her with his evil eyes that she always despised fixed on her, and she knew that this was her end. She did not feel the pain that the old man inflicted upon her. She decided to put her mind elsewhere. She dreamed of the wonderful things she loved in life and of her sister and how she would soon be with her. As she lay there taking her final breaths, she whispered to the man that she would come back to haunt him. He laughed at her, but she knew that she wasn't joking. She had made up her mind right then and there that she was going to make him pay.

            The police never found Luis’s body and the old man made sure of that. He hid it somewhere where he could always keep track of it. Under the house, in a chest buried far into the ground lay Luis. The old man prided himself on his hiding place; it was right under the police’s noses. He never took the smirk off his face until one night he heard the clink, clink, clinking of milk bottles. He blamed the noise on different things only to rest his mind. But, as he lay in bed he felt the presence of someone appear and the warm breath of Luis as she whispered into his ears, “I told you I’d come back.”