The Book Thief - Review

The Book Thief is a book that I never would have heard about if it hadn’t been for John Green. If you have never heard of John Green then here is the summary – he is a young adult novelist and one half of the Vlogbrothers, seriously you should check him out. John Green recommended The Book Thief in one of his videos, just look up the Vlogbrothers on YouTube already, and I thought that I would give it a chance. I cannot begin to tell you how happy I am that I read this book. It makes you think about things that you never even dreamed of thinking about before, and the writing is amazing.

The Book Thief by Markus Zusak is about a girl, Liesel Meminger, who lived during Nazi Germany. Liesel is put through a lot of hard times, but to get through everything she starts to steal books…from Nazi book burnings, from the Mayor’s wife. With the help of her foster father Liesel learns to read, and words are what end up saving her.

This story makes you think about what it was like for the civilians of Germany during World War Two. In any history class that I had ever taken I had only heard that Germany was the enemy, but I never really thought about what it would have been like for the people living in the enemy country at that time. It is really interesting and heartbreaking to think that there were Germans, who were not Jewish, who were against the things that Hitler was doing. It is also really hard to think that when the Allies, the good guys in history, where bombing Germany they were killing people who actually agreed with them. This book really makes you think about the fact that not all Germans were the bad guys.

The thing that I liked the most about The Book Thief is that it wasn’t narrated by Liesel, but instead was narrated by Death. It is a really different concept to have Death tell the story, Death was probably the most present figure during World War Two and to think that this was the one story that gripped Death so much that Death felt the need to tell it makes it that much more important. There also isn’t a bias because Death isn’t on one side or the other. Death doesn’t enjoy the fact that there are more souls to collect, Death doesn’t care who wins, and Death just wants the war to be over. I love the emotion that Death presents; Death truly cares about each and every soul that Death takes.  

I recommend The Book Thief to everyone. In this review I have not even scratched the surface of what this book is about. I think that it is an important book with important themes, and as the New York Times says, life changing. Please don’t let the Young Adult Novel stamp trick you, The Book Thief is a book for all ages.