Book of the Week

 The element that surprised me when I read this book, a few years ago, was the narrator of the story: death itself. I think the writer was right to tell the story from the point of view of death, after all,  there's no better narrator to tell a story set in World War II. Also liked how the writer gave humanity to the character's death, making the reader sympathize with it and feel sorry for it (priceless the last setence of the novel, my favorite,  wich manages to send chills down my spine).

“Please believe me when I tell you that I picked up each soul that day as if it were newly born. I even kissed a few weary, poisoned cheeks. I listened to their last, gasping cries. Their vanishing words. I watched their love visions and freed them from their fear.” 

 It is 1939. Nazi Germany. The country is holding its breath. Death has never been busier, and will become busier still. Liesel Meminger is a foster girl living outside of Munich, who scratches out a meager existence for herself by stealing when she encounters something she can’t resist: books. With the help of her accordion-playing foster father, she learns to read and shares her stolen books with her neighbors during bombing raids as well as with the Jewish man hidden in her basement.