Mailbox Monday Moratorium Monday

Admittedly, I have a problem.

In Friday's post, I mentioned seven books I've recently won, all of which arrived in the mail, and I just found out this morning that I've won another book, Mr. Fitzwilliam Darcy: The Last Man in the World by Abigail Reynolds, from Anna's book blog, Diary of an Eccentric. I've also been receiving other books in the mail, from authors and publishers, as well as a few that I've ordered.

On Sunday my daughters and I ventured to Barnes & Noble, armed with a couple of gift cards and my membership card. (Whenever I go to a bookstore or the book section of a store, I can't help but smile as I see many of the books I've posted about or read about on other blogs. I want to tell everyone around that I'm a book blogger, but at most I tell a salesperson or two.) As far as purchases go, my daughter bought a joke book for her teacher's birthday, and I bought one book, Giovanni's Room by James Baldwin, because I've decided that I must read a book by this author.

But, enough is enough! While I love getting new books, I already have so many books waiting to be read, and my gargantuan to-be-read pile is growing every day. It's getting to be ridiculous! Maybe I should impose a moratorium on getting any additional books.


Sometimes, I wish I were more like the protagonist, Liesel Meminger, in The Book Thief. She has only a few books, reads them one-at-a-time, lingers with each book, gets to know each one deeply, and greatly appreciates each book. Too often I feel as if I am racing through my books, not savoring them enough. The sight of so many books waiting to be read causes me to feel a bit anxious and guilty at times. How will I ever be able read them all? And yet, I keep entering book giveaways, I keep finding more books which interest me, I keep purchasing books, and lo and behold! I keep finding more books in the mailbox.

This is my fourth official Mailbox Monday, a terrific meme where readers share the books they've recently acquired, hosted by Marcia from The Printed Page. I'd ask what new books you've gotten lately, but I'm afraid that I'd discover intriguing new titles to add to my to-be-read pile!

The Book Thief: The Power of Books

So many people raved about this book by Markus Zusak that I had to get a copy of it for myself. However, once I did, I put The Book Thief on a shelf under some other books. I wasn't sure I was in the mood to read a book for young adults. However, when I started reading it, I wondered if it really was intended for children. The book's major themes are rather adult in nature: the power of books and reading, love and compassion, brutality, the Holocaust, war, and death. In fact, the narrator of the story is Death, although not a mean and conniving death, but a gentle and sometimes even humorous presence, a "reluctant collector of souls". I've since learned that The Book Thief, published in 2005, was originally published in Australia as a book for adults.

The Book Thief is the story of a young German girl, Liesel Meminger. While traveling to Molching, a small town outside of Munich in Nazi Germany, Liesel's baby brother suddenly dies. In a snowy graveyard Liesel steals her first book, The Gravedigger’s Handbook. At this point, Death, the narrator, becomes intrigued by the girl and starts to tell her story. She's given to foster parents, Hans and Rosa Hubermann, for reasons that she does not yet comprehend (her biological mother has been labeled a Kommunist and is taken away). Despite Rosa's obstreperous and frequent swearing, Liesel feels secure and loved by her foster parents. She develops a special bond with her foster father, a gentle soul with silver eyes who patiently helps her learn how to read. Throughout the story her love of reading grows and becomes more significant, and she "picks up" a few more books. Liesel becomes best friends with a boy named Rudy ("with hair the color of lemons"), goes to school, and life is pretty good, although she's still haunted by her brother's death. But soon everything changes for the worse. As Germany prepares for WWII, Jews are threatened and taken away, and the Hubermanns, who oppose this senseless brutality, hide a Jew named Max Vandenburg in their basement. Germany's brutality toward Jewish people, and to those helpful to Jews, is a dominant theme in this book.
Throughout the book, Liesel is drawn in by the power of words and books and reads at every opportunity, sometimes aloud to others. She learns the significance of words--words in her books that help her escape from a bleak life, as well as words which hold the country under the hideous control of Hitler and the Nazi party. Hitler's autobiography and book of political ideology, Mein Kampf, is important in several ways in The Book Thief.
Let me stop now--before I give away too much of this book. The Book Thief is quite original, touching, and beautifully written. It brought to mind two other books I've read about the horrors of the Holocaust and Nazi Germany, Stones from the River by Ursula Hegi, and The Reader by Bernhard Schlink. In 2007, The Book Thief won the Michael L. Printz Honor Book Award and the Boeke Prize, and in 2009 it became a bestseller on the NY Times' list of children's books. I cannot recommend it highly enough, especially to adults.
If you've read The Book Thief or have a related thought, please leave a comment. For another review of this book, please visit The Reading Life.