I've begun reading The Book Thief by Markus Zusak and i'll just say that I'm nothing short of amazed. I'm consuming each page, each word of this story like it's my favorite meal. Where better to start then at the beginning.
"You are going to die". Ominous? Haunting? or maybe it's the fact that the narrator of this story is Death that would have you abandoning the book and choosing a brighter one. I'm still stumbling on his obsession with colors. Chocolate brown (his favorite), thick soupy red, and blinding global white. Maybe a distraction from his aphotic occupation. Black is not a color. I get the feeling that Death is no dark-hooded grim reaper come to rip us from life. He is sympathetic, but as he explains, he is fair. "I am not violent, I am not malicious, I am a result". A result of our actions?
Death tells us the story of Liesel Meminger. The book thief. Eyes are the color brown (Death notes), dangerous in Germany as Hitler casts his dark shadow across the country. The first book stolen, black and rectangular with silver writing, is The Grave Digger's Handbook. "A twelve-step guide to grave-digging sucess". As enjoyable as it sounds, L can't read the book. She is illiterate. L encounters this book, and begins her career, at her brothers funeral. A small boy, collected by Death on a train to Munich. L continues the journey to Munich where she meets her foster parents, Rosa and Hans Hubermann.
Favorite character: Hans Hubermann. His eyes made of silver. There's just something about him...
The Grave Digger's Handbook is hidden under L's mattress. Once Hans finds it, he begins the struggle of teaching Liesel to write. She is described as "a girl with a mountain to climb". Maybe this mountain is more than just words.
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