The Book Theif

The book that I just finished reading, and am doing for my book project, is The Book Thief, by Markus Zusak. (I have read all 584/584 pages). It was an amazing book, even though it was extremely sad in the end. I was actually crying my eyes out! 

It has won various awards, including some very honorable ones. 

It is a historical fiction story, set in World War 2, in village in Germany.

The main character and protagonist is Liesel Meminger, who develops a lot in the book. She starts out as nine year old, and it ends when she is 14 (she is then an elderly woman in the epilogue...) I shall describe her and her personality as she is throughout most of the book, as a child. 

Liesel is the 'Book Thief' that the book is named after. She is a young German girl, who lives in a small village by the name of Molching (which is fictional). She lives with her foster parents, Hans and Rosa Hubermann.

She had quite a sad time before she came to live with her foster parents, as her father abandoned the mother, and the mother had to get someone to foster Liesel and her brother, because her mother was afraid that the Führer would take them away. Unfortunately her brother dies on the way to the foster home, so Liesel is on her own. ‘Every night, Liesel would nightmare’ (pg. 37)

“Her hair was a close enough brand of German-blonde, but she had dangerous eyes. Dark brown” (pg. 31.)  It is also described that she had bony arms and legs, though she was quite strong, after almost ‘killing’ a classmate, in having a fight. 

She is called the Book Thief because.... *drumroll*... she steals books! Throughout the plot she continuously continues to steal books, as she loves reading. She learns to read with her foster father, by reading her first ‘stolen’ book, which she picked up on the floor at her brothers funeral, ‘The Gravediggers Handbook.’ “The book thief struck for the first time- the beginning of an illustrious career.” (pg. 29)

She would do anything to get a book – she even stole a book from a Jewish book burning on the Führer’s (Hitler’s) birthday. Also she would commonly steal from the Mayors library.

“As Liesel would discover, a good thief requires many things.    
Stealth. Nerve. Speed.
More important than any of those things, however, was one final requirement.
Luck.”

Liesel was also quite a strong character, because at the end something very tragic happens, but she stays strong, and continues in life.

So there you go, I wrote about the main character of the Book Thief, Liesel. This blog post took me 3 days to write, due to school laptops crashing, cats, airplanes, cold weather and Drop Box.  BYE!