The Bookworm Wife Recommends…

The Book Thief, By Markus Zusak
(source)

This book was recommended to me by lots of people, but it wasn’t until I read about it on my friend Ghenet’s blog [side note:  go read her blog.  She is a young adult fiction writer and her blog is really interesting and fun if you love those kinds of books---and even if you don’t!  Seriously, she’s great.  She also blogged her wedding!] that I decided to take the plunge and read it.  And guys, it was so good—it definitely lives up to the hype!

The Book Thief is the story of Liesel Meminger, a young German girl sent to live with foster parents in a tiny town in Germany during World War II.  Through the course of the book, the war wages on, Liesel learns to read, and she begins to steal books—hard to come by during the war—from wherever she can get them.  Along the way, she gains a rag-tag group of friends: Rudy, a neighborhood boy; Max, a Jewish refugee; and the mayor’s reclusive wife, amongst others.  The narrator of the story is Death.  Yes, you read that right, Death—who brings to light the horrors of World War II while weaving the wonderful tale of Liesel, her beloved books, and how the war changed her life forever.

Admittedly, the prose was hard for me to get used to at first.  Zusak uses choppy “interruptions” throughout the novel to give details of the story and drive the plot.  By the end, however, I didn’t find them so jarring anymore.  In fact, now I can’t imagine the book without them!

If you like stories about World War II or young adult fiction, this book is a win.  I give it 3 out of 4 stars.

And on that note, I need a new rating system.  I hate using stars—BORING!  Anyone got any cheeky ideas?