Review: All The Light We Cannot See – Anthony Doerr

All The Light We Cannot See – Anthony Doerr

Marie-Laure lives with her father in Paris near the Museum of Natural History, where he works as the master of its thousands of locks. When she is six, Marie-Laure goes blind and her father builds a perfect miniature of their neighborhood so she can memorize it by touch and navigate her way home. When she is twelve, the Nazis occupy Paris and father and daughter flee to the walled citadel of Saint-Malo, where Marie-Laure’s reclusive great-uncle lives in a tall house by the sea. With them they carry what might be the museum’s most valuable and dangerous jewel. 

In a mining town in Germany, the orphan Werner grows up with his younger sister, enchanted by a crude radio they find. Werner becomes an expert at building and fixing these crucial new instruments, a talent that wins him a place at a brutal academy for Hitler Youth, then a special assignment to track the resistance. More and more aware of the human cost of his intelligence, Werner travels through the heart of the war and, finally, into Saint-Malo, where his story and Marie-Laure’s converge.

Review: Why is it so hard to review books I love? I’ve been thinking about this novel for days, and I still have no words. This might be my new favorite read of 2016. I don’t know what to say to make you read it.

“It's embarrassingly plain how inadequate language is.” – All the Light We Cannot See

This story is told from many points-of-view, but the two main characters are sixteen-year-old Marie-Laure and eighteen-year-old Werner. Marie-Laure is blind and in possession of a valuable jewel that her father took from a museum. In the middle of the siege of Saint-Malo, the jewel is being hunted by a crazy man. Meanwhile, Werner, a German soldier, is working on a radio in the basement of a French hotel—until a bomb hits the hotel and it collapses on top of him. He can hear Marie-Laure pleading for help over the airwaves, but can he escape from the rubble in time to save her?

I don’t even know where to start with this review. My copy of the book is jam-packed with pink sticky notes because I love the characters, and the writing style, and the nonlinear structure, and the way the chapters are divided. This book is a chunker (over 500 pages), but I read 300 pages in one day because I needed to know what happened next. Whenever I wasn’t reading the book, I was thinking about it. Every time I put it down, it somehow ended up in my hands again. It’s been a long time since a book has had that kind of grip on my imagination.

I want to rave about everything, but there are too many spoilers. I guess I can say that my favorite element of the story is the jewel. Mixing the legend of the jewel with a WWII battle is pure genius. According to the legend, whoever holds the jewel cannot die. The crazy man who is hunting Marie-Laure is desperate to save his own life. A blind girl and a cancer-riddled man are willing to stay in a warzone because of this stone. It shows the lengths people will go to in order to save themselves (and others). Deep down, the characters know that magic and legends aren’t real, but there’s always a tiny chance that they could be real, right?

I love the imagery. It’s kind of ironic that a book about a blind girl is so rich in visual imagery. Everything in this story is vivid. It’s easy to picture the characters and events. Certain scenes (such as the ones with the ocean critters in the kennel) will stick in my mind for a long time.

Another love: the lack of stereotypes. Marie-Laure is blind, but she’s far from “disabled.” She has hobbies, desires, and her own way of experiencing the world. She can find the light in every situation, even though she can’t see it. Werner is a Nazi, but he isn’t evil. He’s a soldier. When he hears a young French girl asking for help on the radio, he’ll willingly risk his life to find her.

“Open your eyes and see what you can with them before they close forever.” – All the Light We Cannot See

 

“You know the greatest lesson of history? It’s that history is whatever the victors say it is. That’s the lesson. Whoever wins, that’s who decides the history. We act in our own self-interest. Of course we do. Name me a person or a nation who does not. The trick is figuring out where your interests are.” – All the Light We Cannot See

Okay. I have to come up with something to criticize, or I’m going to start fangirling, and I’m way too dignified for that kind of nonsense.

The first 200 pages of the book are much slower than the last 300. Luckily, the writing is gorgeous, so that pulled me through. If you’re looking for a love story, you won’t find one here. If you don’t like books with dense descriptions or complex narrative structures, you might want to skip this one. I love those things, though. This is a total “Me” novel. It has literally everything I want in a story.

And, I’m heading toward fangirling again. See what this book has reduced me to?  

I’m going to stop now.

Just go read it. It won a Pulitzer for a reason . . .

Top Ten Tuesday: Books Set Outside The USA

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme hosted by The Broke and the Bookish. This week’s topic is top ten books set outside the USA. It’s collage time! I’ve read a lot of books set outside the US, and I couldn’t pick favorites, so I chose a random assortment and grouped them roughly by continent. I also threw in a few immigrant stories and books that are set in multiple countries.

Books Set Outside The USA

Asia

Australia

Mainland Europe

UK/Ireland

A Few Random Others

Iceland / Norway / Midway Atoll / Botswana / Haiti / Antarctica / Mars / Mexico / Canada / Africa

What is your favorite book set outside the USA?

Review: Forgive Me, Leonard Peacock – Matthew Quick

Forgive Me, Leonard Peacock – Matthew Quick

Today is Leonard Peacock’s birthday. It is also the day he hides a gun in his backpack. Because today is the day he will kill his former best friend, and then himself, with his grandfather’s P-38 pistol. 

But first he must say goodbye to the four people who matter most to him: his Humphrey Bogart-obsessed next-door neighbor, Walt; his classmate, Baback, a violin virtuoso; Lauren, the Christian homeschooler he has a crush on; and Herr Silverman, who teaches the high school’s class on the Holocaust. Speaking to each in turn, Leonard slowly reveals his secrets as the hours tick by and the moment of truth approaches.

Review: I have book review déjà vu. I feel like I just read (and kind of hated) this book about a week ago. There was a point in Forgive Me, Leonard Peacock (the bottom of page 69, actually) where I threw the book down and thought, Not this AGAIN! NO NO NO NO! I just don’t understand the appeal of this “deep, dark secret” mental illness plot.

I was interested in this book because it was described to me as part dystopia, part high school contemporary. That sounds pretty cool, right? What’s more dystopian than a modern-day high school?

On Leonard’s eighteenth birthday, he plans to kill his former best friend and then himself. We follow him through his school day as he says goodbye to his few friends and works up the courage to carry out his plan. Sprinkled throughout the book are letters that Leonard writes to himself from his ideal future. In his imagination, the future is a post-apocalyptic world that is mostly covered by water. He lives in a lighthouse with his wife and daughter and is very happy.

The letters are my favorite part of the book. The explanation for them comes far too late, so they’re a little jarring to read, but they’re unique. They show a lot about Leonard’s character. Not many people would say that their ideal future is a world where pretty much everybody is dead. The upbeat tone of the letters also provides relief from Leonard’s self-obsessed attitude.

“I feel like I’m broken—like I don’t fit together anymore. Like there’s no more room for me in the world or something. Like I’ve overstayed my welcome here on Earth, and everyone’s trying to give me hints about that constantly. Like I should just check out.” – Forgive Me, Leonard Peacock

 

“we can simultaneously be human and monster—that both of those possibilities are in all of us.” – Forgive Me, Leonard Peacock

Leonard is hiding a secret from the reader. His former best friend, Asher, did something awful to him. I’ve seen this same plot in a lot of other “mental illness” books, and I’m not a fan. I’m just going to copy my review for one of the other books, change the character names, and paste it here. You know that a plotline is overdone when the same review works for multiple books.

[Start copy/paste.]

On one hand, I know that this is an extremely important book. Young adult stories about trauma and illness are necessary because (unfortunately) many young readers have had trauma and/or mental illness in their lives. Everyone deserves to see themselves in a book.

On the other hand, I found this novel to be really, really predictable. Leonard has a deep, dark, traumatic secret that he’s hiding from everybody. It’s the exact same deep, dark, traumatic secret that a ton of other YA protagonists are hiding. I feel like I’ve read this book before. Many, many times. I could see his secret coming from a thousand miles away. Since I figured out his secret relatively early, I had to sit through 100+ pages of tedious angst while I waited for him to tell me what I already knew. If I hadn’t been reading this book for a class, I wouldn’t have finished it. Predictable books frustrate me.

[End copy/paste.]

I struggled to connect with every character in this book. A lot of them feel like stereotypes. There’s the depressed teen, the quirky old man, the absentee parents, the hero teacher. Leonard’s plan to kill Asher and commit suicide never seems all that threatening, and my brain was always several steps ahead of the plot. Maybe I need to give up on “mental illness” books because this one didn’t do much that I haven’t seen before.

I know this review sounds pretty negative. This isn’t a horrible book. I can see why it has so many positive reviews. It’s well-written and very quick to read. Up until page 69, when I figured out what Asher did to Leonard, I was intrigued by the story. It has an excellent message for teens who are struggling through high school. But, overall, this novel just isn’t unique enough for me.

“‘I can tell you get it—you're different. And I know how hard being different can be. But I also know how powerful a weapon being different can be. How the world needs such weapons. Gandhi was different. All great people are. And unique people such as you and me need to seek out other unique people who understand—so we don't get too lonely and end up where you did tonight.’” – Forgive Me, Leonard Peacock

The Sunday Post #56

The Sunday Post is hosted by The Caffeinated Book Reviewer. It’s a chance to recap the past week, talk about next week, and share news. It’s Monday, What Are You Reading? is hosted by Book Date. I get to tell you what I’ve read recently.

On The Blog Last Week

• On Monday I reviewed Charm & Strange by Stephanie Kuehn.
• On Tuesday I listed some bookish facts about myself.
• On Wednesday I reviewed Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit by Jeanette Winterson.
• On Thursday I talked about why diverse books matter to me.

On The Blog This Week

• On Monday I review Forgive Me, Leonard Peacock by Matthew Quick.
• On Tuesday I show you some books set outside the USA.
• On Wednesday I review All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr.
• On Thursday I do The Diverse Books Tag.

In My Blogging Life

The comments on Why Diverse Books Matter To Me have been really interesting. Go check it out if you haven’t yet.

Is anyone else’s Bloglovin’ feed broken? I follow about 900 blogs, but it only shows me like, 8 posts. This isn’t cool!

In My Reading Life

I read a ton last week. I finished All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr. Then I read Nimona by Noelle Stevenson, All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque, and She is Not Invisible by Marcus Sedgwick. Right now, I’m reading I’ll Meet You There by Heather Demetrios.

In The Rest Of My Life

Five things that made me happy last week:

1. Top Ten Tuesday. I liked learning random things about all my Internet friends.
2. My discussion post. I know I already mentioned it twice, but I had that post saved as a draft for months. I’m glad I actually finished it.
3. I spent some time outside playing with the settings on my camera.
4. While taking pictures, I discovered that there’s a giant toad living under my deck. It gave me something to take pictures of.
5. So much reading.

I hope you had a great week! See you around the blogosphere!