The Lovely Bones Chapter 11 Summary

How It All Goes Down

  • Susie watches her dad get up around 4am every morning to walk Holiday. Every morning, he walks past Mr. Harvey's house.
  • It's late summer, and there's still no progress on the case. Mr. Salmon dreams of killing him, but knows he'll need solid proof before it comes to that.
  • Mr. Harvey is less and less worried about the police. They've almost completely stopped surveillance of him. And he makes sure to blend in and be on his best behavior so none of the neighbors begin to suspect him.
  • He kills cats, dogs, and other small animals. The neighbors blame a mean kid, Joe Ellis, for their missing pets.
  • He kills them, Susie realizes, to try to stop himself from killing another girl, like one of the school girls he can see and hear from his house.
  • In August, the police can't take anymore of Jack Salmon's calls to the police station about Mr. Harvey. Len Fenerman comes over and tells him to stop.
  • Jack realizes that Fenerman is stopping the investigation into Harvey, and that Abigail agrees with everything the police say.
  • That night, Jack sees a light in the cornfield from his window. He thinks it's Harvey. He gets his baseball bat and goes out there.
  • Susie wishes she could tell him that's it's just Clarissa waiting for Brian in the field.
  • When Mr. Salmon sees Clarissa, he runs at her, knocking her down, screaming, "Susie!" (11.113). Brian hears him and as he comes across the field, holding a torchlight.
  • Susie, but nobody else, sees that Mr. Harvey is in fact in the cornfield.
  • Brian shines the light on Mr. Salmon and Clarissa and freaks out. He throws Mr. Salmon off of her, then grabs Mr. Salmon's baseball bat and starts hitting him with it.