A review by birdbrainbooks
The Book Thief by Markus Zusak

dark emotional sad slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.5

This one is tough, because I know this book is beloved by many and I fully expected to love it. I didn’t dislike it—but I also didn’t connect to it the way I hoped and anticipated.
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The choice of having the character of Death serve as narrator is *chef’s kiss* and much of the writing is breathtakingly poetic. But all in all, the story itself wasn’t what I expected—it really consisted of a very long series of vignettes during protagonist Liesel’s childhood in her German town.
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And then, after so much time spent in detail on childhood antics and thievery, the ending was just so....sudden, sad, and bleak. I don’t like when I feel emotionally manipulated by books (looking at you, Kristen Hannah) and I feel like this one took the devastation a bit too far, too close to the end.
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The characters were memorable, but the story overall didn’t accomplish anything particularly new or interesting for me. Perhaps it’s because I grew up reading/watching so many World War 2 and Holocaust stories, and feel that time period is over saturated.
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I wondered if I didn’t fully connect because I listened on audio, but I don’t think that’s it—the narrator was great and I’ve connected with other books on audio. There were certain phrases that were so overused that it started to grate on my nerves. Maybe I just wasn’t the target audience, since it’s YA. But whatever the reason, it was without a doubt a good book but didn’t totally work for me.
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