The Lovely Bones Characters

Jack, Susie's dad, is the frustrated hero of the piece. He's the loving father who knows the truth of his daughter's murder, but can't prove it. His struggle is perhaps most poignant. He sticks it...

Abigail is Susie's mom and a complicated woman. Her love for Susie is apparent in her intimate knowledge of things Susie related, as detailed to Len Fenerman. But, as Susie had already learned from...

Lindsey, Susie's little sister, is thirteen when Susie dies. She is the living hero of the story Susie is watching and telling. Her story begins in winter in chaos, and ends in spring in reunion, m...

Buckley is Susie's little brother, the youngest Salmon child. He's about four when Susie is killed. Susie had a warm and close relationship with Buckley and even saved his life when he was chocking...

Fenerman (in the movie played by Michael Imperioli of Sopranos fame) is the detective in charge of Susie's case and a recent widower. He's part of the novel's love triangle; he has an affair with S...

Ruth is Susie's age, fourteen, when Susie dies. She and Susie had recently become friends, connecting over Ruth's art. Ruth is ghost-Susie's Earthly counterpart. Susie wishes she were alive and is...

Ray Singh is Susie's first crush, first kiss, and first love. He and Susie were just getting to know each other when she died. The love letter he slipped into her schoolbooks on the day of her deat...

Samuel is Lindsey's boyfriend. About the time Susie leaves her life, Samuel enters it, bearing half-a-heart pendants, kisses, and unlimited moral support. Samuel is super smart and super athletic l...

Lynn is Abigail Salmon's mom. She's a hard drinking, hard flirting, fashion conscious lady who comes to the rescue after Susie's death, keeping Salmon house and just plain being there. Without Lynn...

Abigail Suzanne is Lindsey and Samuel's baby, who we see for just a moment at the end of the novel. She is important to the idea of renewal and renovation in the novel.

Hal is Samuel's older brother. He rides a motorcycle and has a motorcycle repair shop across from the sinkhole where Susie's body is dumped. Although not a major character, he becomes very importan...

Ruana is Ray's mom. She's a supportive figure, who eventually becomes friends with Jack and Abigail after Susie's death. Although not a major character, she does drive an important element of the p...

Clarissa is Susie's close friend when she's alive. But, Clarissa can't hold up to the demands of being friends with a dead person. Granted, the scene with Jack Salmon sort of attacking her in the c...

Brian is Clarissa's boyfriend. He beats Jack in the knee with a baseball bat when Jack almost attacks Clarissa, thinking she's Mr. Harvey.

Holly is Susie's roommate in her first heaven, but we don't get her back-story. Since she's in Susie's heaven, and seems to relate to her situation, we assume she had a similar kind of death. Since...

Franny is Susie's "intake counselor" in the first heaven. As with Susie, her profession in life, counselor, continues into the afterlife. Franny, unlike Susie, knows the ways of the afterworld, and...

Granddad seems to be Jack's dad. Susie meets him in heaven and later goes to live with him in wide wide Heaven. They tour Earth together, and are both watching on the day that Mr. Harvey meets his...

Sophie was a 49-year-old woman who rented Mr. Harvey a room and had sex with him consensually in 1960, after which he murdered her. Mr. Salmon remembers Harvey telling them that his late wife's nam...

Ralph is Sophie's son. He's a Hell's Angel, who knows Hal Heckler through Hal's bike shop. Eventually, they realize that Susie and Sophie are victims of the same man.

Leida was six when Mr. Harvey murdered her in 1960. She's his youngest victim.

Flora was eight years old when she was raped and murdered by Harvey in 1963.

Jackie was thirteen when Mr. Harvey raped and murdered her in 1967.

Leah was twelve when Mr. Harvey raped and murdered her in 1969. When Len Fenerman asks Mr. Harvey the name of his late wife, he tells him it's Leah.

Wendy was thirteen when Mr. Harvey raped and murdered her in 1971.

We are told that Mr. Harvey raped and murdered a waitress sometime after he murdered Susie.

At the end of the novel, we are shown a teenage girl who is almost Mr. Harvey's next victim. She walks away, but was probably only spared by the falling icicle which sends Mr. Harvey to his snowy g...

Clair is a New Jersey girl Mr. Harvey managed to entice into his van. Luckily, she got away unharmed.

Holiday is the Salmon family's beloved pooch. When he dies, he goes to Susie's heaven.

Nate is Buckley's friend. Buckley stays at Nate's house when Susie is initially missing. Nate is the person Buckley tells that he can see Susie after she is dead.

Mr. Connor is Ruth's dad. Although not a major figure, he contributes to the building motif. Near the end of the story, Samuel learns that the old Victorian house he and Lindsey found is owned by M...

These are teachers at Susie's junior high. They give Ruth a hard time because she draws anatomically correct nude women in art class.

Mrs. Dewitt is Susie, Ray, and Ruth's English teacher.

Mr. Dewitt coaches the boys' soccer team, which Lindsey is allowed to try out for.

Mr. Botte is Susie's biology teacher, her favorite teacher. About eighteen months after Susie dies, he loses his daughter to leukemia.

Mrs. Stead is a therapist at Susie's school. She tells Len Fenerman that Susie was reading Othello and To Kill A Mockingbird.

Principal Caden is the principal at Susie's school. He tries but fails to comfort Lindsey after Susie's death.

Mrs. Koekle is Buckley's kindergarten teacher, on whom he has a crush.

Bethel Utemeyer is the oldest inhabitant of Susie's heaven. Susie had attended her funeral. Apparently, she lost her daughter, Natalie, when Natalie was a child. Natalie and her mother are reunited...

The reverend that presides over Susie's funeral.

Artie is the son of a mortician. He's known for chasing people with imaginary syringes filled with imaginary embalming fluid. The boy also draws these things all over his notebooks. At the Gifted a...

Joe Ellis is at first the scapegoat for Mr. Harvey's crimes against neighborhood pets. He never gets over being accused of hurting animals.

Grace is Susie's neighbor, a girl around her age. She is Susie's first photography subject, when Susie gets her first camera.