Book Review: The Book Thief

Before I read this book, I gave it to my boyfriend’s father to explore. A keen reader, it took him only two days to complete, and he gave it 7.5 out of 10, which according to my calculations is a 3.75 out of 5 stars in my own star system. Not bad! Now let’s see what I thought!

Set in Nazi Germany, Liesel Meminger and her younger brother are being taken by their mother to live with a foster family. Liesel has no idea why, but she thinks it may have something to do with her father and the word ‘Kommunist’. On the journey, Death visits the young boy, and notices Liesel. At her brother’s graveside, she finds an object in the snow – a small publication called The Gravedigger’s Handbook.

As Liesel is an illiterate ten-year-old, her silver-eyed foster father teaches her to read. Soon books and words become an addiction, and Liesel begins stealing books from all over her adopted town – Nazi book-burnings and the mayor’s wife’s library to name a couple.

With Nazi Germany at war and a favour to repay, Liesel’s foster family then hides a Jew in their basement. Such dangerous times make Liesel question the power of words – are they that fantastic after all?

As I am an English teacher, I really loved the theme of words in this book. Words can open up people’s worlds by allowing them to step up in the world, to understand, to comprehend. But they can also be hurtful and help to brainwash people, from small insults to large propaganda campaigns. No one would have trusted the man who parted his hair on the opposite side and had a small, strange moustache if he could not speak!

I also liked how Death was Zusak’s narrator, as he/she visited characters in the story but also kept an eye on the very petite Liesel. Through this narration, Zusak was also able to use the clever writing technique called foreshadowing. Hence, Death often listed the characters who would eventually meet him/her, or gave us a brief warning that they only had a month to live, but did not disclose exactly when in the book it would occur. This created suspense in my reading and consequently I wanted more!

But be warned. I found the first few chapters a heavy slog until events began to happen. Like To Kill A Mockingbird, all the juicy stuff occurs in the second half of the book! But overall, the book is beautifully and cleverly written with some fantastic similes and metaphors included. I will finish this review with my favourite simile of the book and describes a shop-owner:

“His teeth were like a football crowd, crammed in.”

4 out of 5 stars