The Book Thief

by Markus Zusak

When someone says "Holocaust novel," the first thing that comes to mind is a tearjerking story of Jews who were tossed into a concentration camp, right? The camp of choice for fictitious stories is usually the ever-infamous Auschwitz, while true stories tend to have more variation. The Book Thief is not an average Holocaust novel.

Liesl Meminger's mother has given her up for adoption. Liesl ends up living with a foster family, the Hubermanns. They are a German family: Papa (Hans) Hubermann, and his wife Rosa (aka Mama). Liesl joins the Hitler Youth, becomes friends with Rudy, a neighbourhood soccer teammate, and is generally a good German girl in the 1940s. But then a Jewish man from Papa Hubermann's history comes to the house and they have a Jew living in their basement in the midst of the Holocaust.

This story, narrated by Death, is fascinating. Instead of a typical concentration-camp story, Death follows Liesl and her life in Nazi Germany. I highly recommend this to anyone who like Holocaust fiction (and even those who don't--it's really, really good!). But start reading some time in the day, or else you won't have time to sleep at night. It's an all-night story.