Dynamic Characters- Susie Salmon vs. Lena ???

Susie, the girl who never grows up, makes for an interesting main character in Alice Sebold's The Lovely Bones, I was not sure about how I felt about reading a book from the point of view of a dead teenager. Even though I wonder if I agree that the dead can change as much as Susie does through the course of the book- I picture death as being a release from human yearning, desires, and struggles- I appreciate the idea that Susie is as self-aware in heaven as she was on earth. In other words, her change is from a dead soul who desperately wants to be a part of her family and earthly relationships to being content watching from a distance and enjoying her family's eventual reconciliation. So, since no one truly knows what happens to us after we die, Susie's character development is believable. It is an interesting idea that souls in the after-life go through stages of grief, just like souls left behind on earth do while missing the deceased. Lena, from Wintergirls by Laurie Halse Anderson, moves through the world as if she would make herself invisible, but she is slowly exercising her will in more positive ways than an eating disorder. She is starting to stand up to her mother, father, and for herself, which seems a healthy development, though I am still frustrated by this character more than Susie. I empathize with Susie, the dead girl,more than with Lena, the alive-but-trying-to-make-herself-invisible girl. But I see both characters as wanting to be somewhere, and someone, they are not.