Today, I pretty much marathon-read The Book Thief by Markus Zusak. I started it yesterday, alternating as I usually do between it and other books. This morning, I took up residence in my little beach chair and read several more chapters, skipped over to another book for a few chapters, and then returned to The Book Thief. Apart from breaking for a meal, I read it straight through from there until I was finished.
Wow.
I don’t even want to bother clumsily summarizing its plot, other than to say that it’s set during the Second World War. I’ll quote two sentences from its narrator instead:
I wanted to explain that I am constantly overestimating and underestimating the human race – that rarely do I simply estimate it. I wanted to ask her how the same thing could be so ugly and so glorious, and its words and stories so damning and brilliant.
This is one of those books that I’ll be sharing with others without a doubt. It was given the Michael L. Printz Honor in 2006 and I’m left with one itching question: What the heck won the medal that year?
[I looked it up. American Born Chinese, the first graphic novel to receive the award, won. I just ordered it.]
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