I bought The Book Thief by Markus Zusak around the same time that I picked up King Dork. Both are marketed as “Young Adult” titles. Both are outstanding. Yet, they could not be more different.
The Book Thief begins with a few introductory sentence fragments and then hits you with the following all bold statement:
***HERE IS A TRUE FACT ***
You are going to die.
The narrator speaks from an authoritative position. The narrator is Death. At least Death tries to be reassuring: “I’m nothing if not fair.” Despite the reassurances, Death, as you can imagine, often seems unfair. The book takes place in Germany during World War II. Liesel Meminger is abandoned by her mother to a foster family, because she is unable to care for Liesel and her brother any longer. The brother does not survive the trip. This is when Death first spots Liesel. Liesel and death do not have long conversations and get to be buddies. It’s not that kind of story.
Death tells us Liesel’s story. Liesel lives in small town with a foster family that is struggling to keep themselves afloat during the war. They are not Jews, but the book does deal with how Liesel’s family and the villagers interact (and have previously interacted) with the Jews that they encounter who are ultimately bound for the Dachau concentration camp.
Liesel becomes a book thief by stealing a book about grave digging from one of the apprentice undertakers at her brother’s burial. Although unschooled, she treasures the object. It is all that she owns. Liesel similarly obtains additional books as the opportunities present themselves, becoming a book thief. However, it is a book that was forced upon Liesel’s family by the Party, Mein Kampf, that ultimately becomes the most meaningful to Liesel.
The Book Thief obviously weighs some heavy issues - death, humanity, inhumanity, family, justice, Nazis, compassion, memory, survival, language, The Holocaust. I don’t hang out with many teenagers, so I’m not sure what the young adult crowd would make of this book. Would the King Dork crowd dig this book as well? Who can I call?
I came across a review of The Book Thief written by Janet Maslin of the New York Times around the time that the book came out. It began with what I considered a couple of fairly provocative opening sentences.
Markus Zusak has not really written “Harry Potter and the Holocaust.” It just feels that way.
No it doesn’t. I’ll admit that the quote piqued my interest, but that clever opening doesn’t do the book justice on its own. The book does have a lyrical, almost fairy tale, feel to it. Despite the fact that Death is conversing with you throughout, the book doesn’t feel “magical”. The realism of the story is what keeps the book grounded and deeply moving. If Death were able to step in and alter outcomes by magic, it would have been a different book. It would have felt very cheap actually, given the subject matter.
Maslin says that Liesel is “Potterish in her appeal as she makes her way through a mystifying adult world.” I suppose. Unlike Potter though, she doesn’t have any otherworldly resources at her disposal to confront her real world demons. Liesel is a normal little girl, and unlike the Potter books so far, we have no real guarantees that Liesel and Death are not going to be on more intimate terms over the course of the book. Maslin also insinuates that The Book Thief is not as good as “better books” like Everything Is Illuminated or Vonnegut’s novels. I think that Zusak might take those comparisons.
This is a first rate book throughout. Reading back-to-back Young Adult novels that were so well written (they are both in my top 5 for the year so far), yet so diverse, has blown my mind. What is the cut off on “Young Adult” anyway? The clerk at Barnes & Noble seemed to think that I was too old for the book. Whatever. I hope that I never feel too old for books like this.
In a complete aside: This is the second book by an Australian that I’ve read this year. I can’t think of any Australian authors that I have read other than these two. Are there great Australian books that I have just assumed were British? Or have I just missed out on Australians all together? Where are all the great New Zealand(-er? -ian? -ish?) novels?
You can hear the author talk about his book on NPR.