This is the one where I read an old lady book.

Posted January 14th, 2010 by Mike Lawson

I’m not knocking it…but the entire time I was reading Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold, I couldn’t help but think that this book would be perfect for the older mom demo.  I mean come on – a creepy neighbor rapes and kills a little girl, and then the girl walks her family through the grieving process from heaven.  FROM HEAVEN.

I’m not well-read enough to say “this is an entirely unique idea” or “Sebold ripped the narrator-in-heaven idea from…” but I will say that it was a clever hook that kept my interest enough to breeze through the book in a week or so.

And y’all know that I’m a sucker for a good opening line, and this one got me right away: My name was Salmon, like the fish; first name, Susie. I was fourteen when I was murdered on December 6, 1973. My murderer was a man from our neighborhood. My mother liked his border flowers, and my father talked to him once about fertilizer.

I really wanted to read this book before seeing the movie which is in theaters now, but I really don’t have any interest in paying to go sit and watch a story I just read.  So I may just wait until I can rent it, or I might forget about it and never actually see the movie.  Who knows.

On a side note, I was reading this blog and was tempted to try to read 100 books in 2010.  Do you think that goal is too lofty?

People I respect love the hell out of Nick Hornby, but I’ve never really been too interested in picking him up.  I saw High Fidelity the movie, but never read any of Hornby’s novels.  I know that I have all of those books I got for Christmas, but because of moving they are all in a box and I had to stop at Barnes & Noble and use the gift card to buy this one.