The Book Thief

The Book ThiefBy: Markus Zusak

The Book Thief is about a girl named Liesel Meminger who had just met her new foster parents, Hans and Rosa Hubermann. Liesel wanted to know how read read and write, so her new "papa" taught her. Soon enough, Liesel would begin to love books, making it much harder to resist the urge to steal them. Liesel wanted more books, but she couldnt have them, so she stole them from places like Nazi book burnings, and the mayors wifes library - with the help of her new friend Rudy Steiner. All was well, until one day, her foster family would be hiding a jew in their basement. At that point, everything started shutting down.

Summary

Theme

The general theme of "The Book Thief" is the power in words. I believe this because in the story, Liesel would develop bonds with people she knew, such as Hans Hubermann or Max Vandenburg. Also, it indicates that words are better than weapons, for example, in an article about the book thief, it is mentioned that (at the time the story takes place) Adolf Hitler uses words rather than violence to get people to join Nazism.

Characters

The main character of "The Book Thief" is a girl names Liesel Meminger. Liesel Meminger has curly, german blonde hair and brown eyes. At the beggining of the book, Liesel is around nine or ten years old, while nearing the end of the book she is around fifteen, ending with her being an elderly. Some of the other characters in the book are her foster parents Hans and Rosa Hubermann, her friend Rudy Steiner, and a Jew named Max Vandenburg.

The Book Thief takes place on a street called Himmel Street in a town called Molching in Nazi Germany. The story takes place in the years from 1939 to 1943.

I would reccomend this book to many people. People of any gender, and people, probably ages twelve and up. I would also reccomend this to people who enjoy Historical Fiction. This book has a lot of symbols of deeper meaning than one might suspect and a lot of higher level word choice.

Recommendation

Settings

Look at the article mentioned above in "Theme"