About this title: A woman steps over the line into the unthinkable in this brilliant, powerful, and unforgettable new novel by the author of "The Lovely Bones and Lucky". Helen Knightly has spent a lifetime trying to win the love of a mother who had none to spare. And as this electrifying novel opens, she steps over a boundary she never dreamt she would even ...
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Note: This is a general synopsis. Each listing is described below.
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Little Brown and Company
Date Published: 10/2007
ISBN-13:9780316677462ISBN:0316677469
Description: Very good in very good dust jacket. Very Good, In very good dust jacket. Glued binding. Paper over boards. With dust jacket. 291 p. read more
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Little Brown and Company
Date Published: 10/2007
ISBN-13:9780316677462ISBN:0316677469
Description: Very good in very good dust jacket. Very Good, In very good dust jacket. Glued binding. Paper over boards. With dust jacket. 291 p. read more
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Little Brown and Company
Date Published: 2007
ISBN-13:9780316677462ISBN:0316677469
Description: Very good. No dust jacket. hard cover, 2a3, minor shelf/edge wear, no dust jacket. Glued binding. Paper over boards. With dust jacket. 291 p. Audience: General/trade. read more
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Little, Brown and Company
Date Published: 2007
ISBN-13:9780316677462ISBN:0316677469
Description: A wonderful copy with some minor edgewear to the cover. Dust Jacket has some edgewear present. -, Hard Cover, Very Good / Very Good. read more
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Little, Brown and Company
ISBN-13:9780316677462ISBN:0316677469
Description: Good. Purchasing this book supports the King County Library System Foundation. Thriftbooks and KCLSF have partnered to help raise additional funds for the library system. Ex-Library book-will contain library markings. Light shelf wear and minimal interior marks. Millions of satisfied customers and climbing. Thriftbooks is the name you can trust, guaranteed. Spend Less. Read More. read more
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Little, Brown and Company
ISBN-13:9780316677462ISBN:0316677469
Description: Good. Light shelf wear and minimal interior marks. Millions of satisfied customers and climbing. Thriftbooks is the name you can trust, guaranteed. Spend Less. Read More. read more
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Little, Brown and Company
ISBN-13:9780316677462ISBN:0316677469
Description: Good. Light shelf wear and minimal interior marks. Millions of satisfied customers and climbing. Thriftbooks is the name you can trust, guaranteed. Spend Less. Read More. read more
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Little, Brown and Company
ISBN-13:9780316677462ISBN:0316677469
Description: Good. Dust Cover Missing. Light shelf wear and minimal interior marks. Millions of satisfied customers and climbing. Thriftbooks is the name you can trust, guaranteed. Spend Less. Read More. read more
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Little, Brown and Company
ISBN-13:9780316677462ISBN:0316677469
Description: Good. Light shelf wear and minimal interior marks. Millions of satisfied customers and climbing. Thriftbooks is the name you can trust, guaranteed. Spend Less. Read More. read more
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Little, Brown and Company
ISBN-13:9780316677462ISBN:0316677469
Description: Very good. Book has appearance of light use with no easily noticeable wear. Millions of satisfied customers and climbing. Thriftbooks is the name you can trust, guaranteed. Spend Less. Read More. read more
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Little, Brown and Company
ISBN-13:9780316677462ISBN:0316677469
Description: Good. Purchasing this book supports the King County Library System Foundation. Thriftbooks and KCLSF have partnered to help raise additional funds for the library system. Ex-Library book-will contain library markings. Book has appearance of light use with no easily noticeable wear. Millions of satisfied customers and climbing. Thriftbooks is the name you can trust, guaranteed. Spend Less. Read More. read more
Description: Good. Shows some signs of wear, and may have some markings on the inside. Shipped to over one million happy customers. Your purchase benefits world literacy! read more
Description: Good. Former Library book. Shows some signs of wear, and may have some markings on the inside. Shipped to over one million happy customers. Your purchase benefits world literacy! read more
Edition: Large print
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Little Brown, New York
Date Published: 2007-01-01
ISBN-13:9780739488560ISBN:0739488562
Description: Very good. Very minimal damage to the cover (no holes or tears, only minimal scuff marks), in some instances dust jackets are not included, no missing pages, minimal to no highlighting/under. read more
Edition: First Edition. states and 1 in number line
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Little, Brown and Company
Date Published: 2007-10-16
ISBN-13:9780316677462ISBN:0316677469
Binding: Paperback
Publisher: Back Bay Books
Date Published: 2008
ISBN-13:9780316067362ISBN:0316067369
Description: Good. Used item may show library stamps, stickers and marks. Buy with confidence-your satisfaction is guaranteed at B-Logistics! Due to the large scale of our operation, we do not have access to the specific contents/condition of our items. Please note that Expedited shipping is not available at this time. read more
"You would think that a book about a psychopath killing her mother, a book full of sex and violence and insanity, should be interesting. I found myself really bored with this one and had to stop reading it about 80 pages in. The pace is sluggish, with confusing flashbacks that sometimes have nothing to do with the plot. The main character's violent desires are a bit cliche. It was so difficult to pay attention that I suddenly found myself not knowing who some of the minor characters were. This is the first book I have read by Alice Sebold, and I hope her other books aren't this terrible."
"I am very troubled by this book. First, I found it so unnerving that someone could write about killing their mother. What kind of person does that? Well, I googled on Alice Sebold to find out and discovered that Ms. Sebold was brutally raped while attending college at Syracuse University. I believe that this brutal act of violence may be the catalyst that has caused Ms. Sebold to teeter on a violent edge that few authors dare to go. This book is about and told through the voice of Helen. Helen grew up with a mentally ill mother and a father who turned out to be almost as ill. Helen kills her 86 year old mother and the book follows Helen through the events that occur after the crime, as well as, Helen's thoughts of her past. There is a small section of the book that gives the reader an idea of what it was like for Helen to be a daughter of a mother like hers and how the title of the book relates to the story. "The moon is whole all the time, but we can't always see it. What we see is an almost moon or a non-quite moon. The rest is hiding just out of view, but there's only one moon, so we follow it in the sky. We plan our lives based on its rhythms and tides." "I knew I was supposed to understand something from my father's explanation, but what I came away with was that, just as we were stuck with the moon, so too we were stuck with my mother.""
"Sebold has a gift for poetic tone and thoughtful metaphor. I love how you're just toodling along, reading away, and suddenly, BAM! she hits you with something like: "She looked up at me and smiled. 'Bitch,' she said. The thing about dementia is that sometimes you feel like the afflicted person has a trip wire to the truth, as if they can see beneath the skin you hide in." Or: "I got her standing with ease, but once she was upright, she collapsed in my arms. It was all I could do not to drop her, bringing both of us to the ground. As I adapted to the balance of holding her full weight, I could not help but think of my father, how year after year he carried the burden of her, apologized to the neightbors, dried her copious tears, and how this body had folded into his over and over again like so much batter until the two of them became one."
The book spans one 24 hour period, beginning with the narrator killing her mother. It weaves past and present together to form a picture of the family and how events of the past shaped the events that initiate the novel. It has a dark veil drawn over it, infusing most of it with an isolated and suicidal tone. It was not perhaps the smartest move on my part to follow it up with a marathon of Cold Case Files on A&E."
"I have to laugh at the negative reviews of Sebold's Lovely Bones, the comments that Sebold intentionally pulls at the heartstrings of her readers. This book will definitely disprove that. It deserves a serious "WTF." Maybe she was inspired by Murakami's Kafka on the Shore, there are a few similarities. After a powerful first chapter, the book goes completely off the rails. Even knowing what to expect from Sebold's NPR interview, I don't expect to finish this one. It is too sick and disgusting.
But I do think it's a very funny joke to play on readers. It's one of those books where you can imagine the publisher scolding, "You'll never write in this town again!" Who knows, maybe this is a final screw off letter to her publisher, for being unhappy with an existing contract. If you're sick of made-for-movie-adaptation books, then the shock of this immensely successful author turning into Colonel Kurtz, this may be a book worth checking out (but not buying)."
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