All 21 Uses of

approach
in
The Lovely Bones

After conferring around the discovering policeman, Detective Fenerman broke their dark huddle and approached her.
Chpt 2

approached = went to

I watched Ruth approach the soccer field, thinking she was alone.
Chpt 6

approach = get near

"Jack-y," my grandmother said as she approached my parents on the front porch, "we need some stiff drinks!"
Chpt 9 *

approached = moved toward

As dawn approached it was the only light in the room until my sister walked in.
Chpt 12

approached = got near

On Monday, in homeroom, everyone stared at her as she approached the front of the classroom.†
Chpt 2

If her mother or her more approachable teachers did not want to hear the darker reality she had experienced, she would cloak this reality in poetry.†
Chpt 3

It was late when he got there, and he left the safe in his Wagoneer while he approached the house of the Flanagans, who lived on the property where the sinkhole was.†
Chpt 4

"Did you put away your game?" my father asked Buckley, wondering why he persisted in avoiding the topic with the one person who approached it head-on.†
Chpt 5

The rabbits loved the trimmed lawns of the athletic fields, and as Ruth approached she'd see their dark forms line up along the white chalk of the farthest boundaries like some sort of tiny sports team.†
Chpt 6

She made her way up to my family, and when Principal Caden and Mr. Botte saw her they fell away and let her approach.†
Chpt 9

When she saw Len approaching from the end of the long white corridor, she relaxed.†
Chpt 12

She would feel it then, creeping up the side of her calves and into her gut, the onslaught, the grief coming, the tears like a small relentless army approaching the front lines of her eyes, and she would breathe in, taking a large gulp of air to try to stop herself from crying in a public place.†
Chpt 16

"Susie," the man said as I approached and then stopped a few feet from where he stood.†
Chpt 18

As she resumed her normal stride and approached the waiting area, she intercepted a nurse with a message for Jack Salmon in Room 582.†
Chpt 19

By now the rot would have been eclipsed, and it was true, as he approached the area, that no rank smell greeted him.†
Chpt 20

Definitions:

(1) (approach as in: approached the city)
to get closer to (near in space, time, quantity, or quality)
(2) (approach as in: use the best approach)
a way of doing something; or a route that leads to a particular place
(3) (approach as in: approached her with the proposal)
to begin communication with someone about something -- often a proposal or a delicate topic
(4) (meaning too rare to warrant focus)
meaning too rare to warrant focus:

More rarely (and typically only in classic literature), the phrase nearest approach to as used in "her nearest approach to an apology" or "her nearest approach to a smile" typically means that "something is as close to something else as it ever gets." "As near an approach to" can have a similar meaning.