The Book Thief

“A room without books is like a body without a soul.” - Marcus Tullis Cicero

April finally came. It was my turn to choose our book club book, and the pressure was so immense! Being the only girl in our club I had to take extra care to inject a small piece of myself without smothering the guys out with estrogen, romance, girl power, or the Secret Life of Bees. (Although I did quite enjoy that book).

Originally I had wanted to stick with a genre that I was familiar with and loved - autobiography/non-fiction. I overheard an interview on NPR with the Jamal Joseph, the author of his new autobiography called Panther Baby. This book was really one that I wanted to read and I thought the fellas would enjoy, too. The week before it was time to decide, Goodreads recommended The Book Thief to me. I read a few reviews, and after discussing it with a couple of my guys, they decided that the premise for The Book Thief sounded more interesting than that of Panther Baby.        Shows what they know.

The Book Thief had a lot of really great ideas. This story takes place in Germany during World War II, and follows a young girl living with her foster family. The book, being set in such a violent and devastating time period, is appropriately narrated by Death. That idea really interested me at first, but the more I read the less appealing it was. The author clouded up an otherwise great story by ruining surprises and giving away endings. There was too much foreshadowing, but not even in the vague or generalized way. He flat out told you, "If only they would have known that so-and-so would be dead by the end of the week..." Kind of a kill joy.

The characters themselves were really easy to fall in love with. I found myself very upset when some of my favorite characters passed away, even though I knew that it was going to happen.

The author has a very visual writing style and I found myself getting lost in the imagery more than a few times. This book is full of great quotes, and thanks to Markus Zusak I have now added a good 60 more to my favorites on Goodreads.

The book was over 500 pages so it was definitely the longest book thus far (which I am sure I will hear more about over our book discussion brunch on Sunday) and there were parts that I know may have been a little too girly-girly mushy for the guys, but all in all I think this book was pretty good. Similar to The Diary of Anne Frank, The Book Thief was nice to read once, but probably too depressing to ever read again.

 

“His soul sat up. It met me. Those kinds of souls always do - the best ones. The ones who rise up and say "I know who you are and I am ready. Not that I want to go, of course, but I will come." Those souls are always light because more of them have been put out. More of them have already found their way to other places.”  - Death, The Book Thief