This book won the Pulitzer Prize for 2015 for good reason. The author says he spent 10 years writing this book. Doerr uses very short chapters in this book. I thought their use to be unique, plus it moved the action along smartly.
Marie-Laure, a blind Parisian girl, lives with her father near the Museum of Natural History. Her father is the locksmith of the museum, but he spends his evening hours building a model of their neighborhood, so Marie-Laure can learn to navigate around the area. As the Germans start to occupy Paris, the pair flee to Saint-Malo (on the Brittany coast), where Marie-Laure's great-uncle lives near the sea wall.
At the same time, a young German orphan and his sister Jutta, live poorly near the coal mines (where their father was killed). Werner finds a broken radio and learns how to reconstruct it. He becomes skilled at working on radios and is given a place in the German elite training school.
Eventually, Werner and Marie-Laure meet in occupied France. Their lives intersect for less than a day and yet it has profound meaning for them both. The characters are so clearly drawn that I felt I knew what they felt when something frightening - or happy - happened. The writing is absolutely beautiful and enchanting. This is not a war novel; rather, it is a novel showing two young peoples' growth and ability to withstand unthinkable hardships and terrifying circumstances during a war.
The one thing I did not like was the jumping forward and back in time. It killed the motion of the story forward. The author had to rebuild momentum in the next part (there are thirteen parts). Then he repeated the process by jumping to an earlier or later time.
Marie-Laure, a blind Parisian girl, lives with her father near the Museum of Natural History. Her father is the locksmith of the museum, but he spends his evening hours building a model of their neighborhood, so Marie-Laure can learn to navigate around the area. As the Germans start to occupy Paris, the pair flee to Saint-Malo (on the Brittany coast), where Marie-Laure's great-uncle lives near the sea wall.
At the same time, a young German orphan and his sister Jutta, live poorly near the coal mines (where their father was killed). Werner finds a broken radio and learns how to reconstruct it. He becomes skilled at working on radios and is given a place in the German elite training school.
Eventually, Werner and Marie-Laure meet in occupied France. Their lives intersect for less than a day and yet it has profound meaning for them both. The characters are so clearly drawn that I felt I knew what they felt when something frightening - or happy - happened. The writing is absolutely beautiful and enchanting. This is not a war novel; rather, it is a novel showing two young peoples' growth and ability to withstand unthinkable hardships and terrifying circumstances during a war.
The one thing I did not like was the jumping forward and back in time. It killed the motion of the story forward. The author had to rebuild momentum in the next part (there are thirteen parts). Then he repeated the process by jumping to an earlier or later time.
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