A Book thief?


The Book Thief by Mark Zusak
Copyright Date: March 14, 2006
Historical Fiction 
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Wow! What a great story set back in the times of the Nazis, Hitler and the world in the way it was developing. This historical fiction novel is set in the year of 1939 with the story of a girl named Liesel who grew up in the times of World War II and death all around her. Death narrates this book in a tale of emerging in a deep and dark time of history.  Sitting by her brother’s graveside the story begins where Liesel finds a book hidden in the snow which intrigues her to grab and begin reading what was in the pages of this book. She learns to read through these books that she keeps on stealing. During these times that this book is set in, reading was not something that everyone was given the chance to learn. Liesel’s life after her brother’s death becomes hard as she is put into a foster home with the Hubberman’s family. Liesel becomes close with her foster father but does not mesh well with her foster mother. She has hard feelings about her own mother abandoning her to leave her with a foster family. Liesel’s life becomes harder as she misses her brother and struggles in school due to her lack of reading. Enrolled in school, Liesel meets two friends Tommy and Rudy who also have their very own struggles. All this time “Death” narrates through the epilogue of seeing Liesel find the book. It is hard to follow at first in this book. Max is the new twist in the story. Hans fulfills a promise to an old friend to harbor his son which is a jew named Max in his home. Liesel is not sure what to think about this but yet feels sorry for him having to hide in the cellar of their home. Liesel continues to steal books from the Mayor’s home and learns to read. Hans leaves and goes to war in the Nazi army but yet makes a return due to an accident. This story ends with Death during this time narrating the taking of Liesel’s body and returning the book “the book thief” back to her. 

My reaction to this book is I normally like historical fiction such as  the I Survived series but I found this book hard to keep up with. Even though the Holocaust and the World War II times interest me in the history aspect, the book feel short in interesting twists and you could predict what happenend next. I would use this as a teaching moment with teens on how we could change the ending of this book. 

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