Here are two things that are connected – I couldn’t fall asleep last night. I finished reading The Book Thief.  A book that keeps me up at night after I’m done reading, can often be said to be a good book. Or maybe a disturbing book. Or maybe a haunting book. I think it’s safe to say that The Book Thief is easily all three.

I bought this book in a local bookshop in Clinton in December while shopping for Christmas gifts. I’d wandered over to the YA section and was looking for something interesting. I’d already found a few things for others, a couple for me, and was talking with one of their very knowledgeable staff. He recommended The Book Thief to me, saying it was one of the most incredible books he’d read in a long time, and gave me some background. I bought it.

And there it sat. And sat. And sat. I wasn’t sure if I was ready to read a book set in Germany at the time of the rise of Hitler, no matter how well recommended. I started the book in March, just finished last night.

This is a difficult book to read. Zusak is a phenomenal writer; he has a brilliant way with words that you practically have to read to believe. His idea to have Death be the narrator, sometimes writing in first person and sometimes in third was an extraordinary, if not startling, concept. But it was slow reading. I wondered if it was because I was usually reading it at night; were the realities of the economy weighing on my mind, and so on. But in the end, I believe it is simply the subject matter. This was a horrific and shameful chapter in the history of humankind, and you cannot read The Book Thief without your heart being broken a hundred times. Or at least I couldn’t.

The story really does pick up in the last third of the book where the characters’ lives are all moving into more intense situations seeking some hopeful, but never hoped for, resolution. Each character, including Death, is extremely well drawn. Liesel, Rudy, Rosa, Hans, Max, Ilsa Hermann … are, if nothing else, real people in real relationships. But it seemed for me that it took a long time reading before they had become characters that I truly cared about, and I’m not sure why. It may be that the weight of Hitler’s Germany, woven well into the story line, drew me away from feeling more. Or perhaps I was afraid to feel more for them, knowing that Death was always nearby, ready to reach in and carry their souls away. And as he says, it was a very busy time for him.

So while a story dealing with pain and persecution, it is, however, still a story about love, friendship, loyalty, forgiveness, triumph over adversity, hope, and compassion. Markus Zusak is an amazing writer, and he has woven his story and characters together well, even if there is tremendous loss throughout the book. I do recommend The Book Thief … but to whoever reads it, be prepared for being drawn in to the tragic misfortunes of others in a frightening period of history, even while it is oftentimes no more than a backdrop to everyday lives and commonplace circumstances.

What I’m wondering as I write … not even 12 hours from finishing this book … is do I want to pick it up and read it again. And I’m not sure what to make of that.