Lucky Alice Sebold Analysis

Lucky is a novel about author Alice Sebold’s journey through her life after being raped. In Sebold’s freshman year at Syracuse University, she is raped while walking through a park on her way home. In the book, she discusses her experience and how it affected her as a person. The reader watches Sebold grow as a person and change after the traumatic experience. The book focuses on the aftermath of her rape and her family’s reaction as well as the ongoing trial against her rapist. The story takes the reader through Alice’s life as she grows mentally and physically. This story is one of courage and determination. One main theme this novel focuses on is the effect rape has on those around the victim and the victim themselves. After Alice is raped
The reader is able to view the way her traumatic experience affected each of them. Each reacts in their own way, her father not being able to understand what happened to her. He was so caught up in his own opinion,” thinking he understood the rules of the game” (82), that he did not show her sympathy like a father should. Thinking that the only way her rapist was able to rape her was if she let him, he was too close minded to understand. Alice’s mother, on the other hand, was fragile and that made Alice fearful of hurting her by telling her. Even Alice’s first thought is how to come up with a story so her mother would not find out; this is when the reader is able to identify the complications in the inner workings of her family. So a distance was established between Alice and her family from the beginning. Her mother does try to be strong for her daughter though even though at some points the topic being “uncomfortable” (94) for her to sit through, however she is unable to be there completely because of her illness. The reader learns Alice’s childhood consisted of a family that showed no affection towards one another. Her mother and father would never kiss and she always thought it was strange. She would then go and play games with her Barbie dolls and the dolls would have story-lines many children did not think about, like Ken and Barbie getting a divorce. The reason would always be because
There was no way to forget or make the experience disappear. Alice learned to live peacefully with two different realities and reach closure by the end of her trial. As time went on she was able to move on and learn from her experiences as a growing woman, while also having her family accept what she went through. There would always be change from that dreadful night but as time goes on life rebuilds