Jaclyn’s Review: All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr

All the Light We Cannot See
written by Anthony Doerr
published by Scribner, 2014

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Did I enjoy this book? I really struggled to read this book. It was slow and difficult to get into. The story follows a young Parisian girl and her father as they escape the Nazi bombing of Paris. At the same time, it also follows a young German boy enlisted in the Nazi army. Their plots eventually converge, but only briefly before continuing on separate paths again. Additionally, the plot is not always told chronologically–in some chapters, Marie-Laure is alone in the country house after her great-uncle is captured, then she’s in Paris with her father, then she’s back in the country house with her father AND great-uncle. It’s quite difficult to follow. If this were not confusing enough, Werner’s (the German boy) story is told chronologically, but the timeline isn’t the same as Marie-Laure’s. We start following him as a young child in an orphanage, even though he is older than Marie-Laure. Weaving throughout this entire confusing plot is an overarching story of a mystical jewel that the Nazi’s are looking for and Marie-Laure’s father is believed to be guarding. When the story ends, this jewel has taken up quite a bit of the story and adds no real value to the plot. Overall, I did not care for this book.

Would I recommend it? There are many books written about WWII from many different perspectives. As such, I would not recommend reading this particular book when there are so many other great alternatives. This book has a consistently high Amazon rating though, so perhaps you would feel otherwise! I’d love to discuss it with you, if you’ve read this one!
 

 

About the book – from Goodreads: From the highly acclaimed, multiple award-winning Anthony Doerr, the stunningly beautiful instant New York Times bestseller about a blind French girl and a German boy whose paths collide in occupied France as both try to survive the devastation of World War II.

Marie-Laure lives in Paris near the Museum of Natural History, where her father works. 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, Werner Pfennig, an orphan, grows up with his younger sister, enchanted by a crude radio they find that brings them news and stories from places they have never seen or imagined. Werner becomes an expert at building and fixing these crucial new instruments and is enlisted to use his talent to track down the resistance. Deftly interweaving the lives of Marie-Laure and Werner, Doerr illuminates the ways, against all odds, people try to be good to one another.

 

 
 

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** This post first appeared on Every Free Chance Books (everyfreechance.com) on September 20, 2019.