Review: All the Light We Cannot See

Leanne Rands has recently finished reading a book that she enjoyed so much that she had to write a blog post. Enjoy the post and maybe dash out and get hold of a copy to read yourself.

All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr
Recently l had the pleasure of reading this book for the first time and was amazed at the depth of my emotional response to the plot and plight of Marie-Laurie and Werner. I particularly enjoyed the intriguing manner in which Anthony Doerr deftly interweaves the lives of Marie-Laurie and Werner, encapsulating the theme that against all odds people should try to be good to one another. It is not surprising that All the light we cannot see was the 2015 Pulitzer Prize Winner in Fiction.
Doerr skilfully uses a variety of metaphors and vivid, often challenging descriptions to engage the reader. Ten years in the writing, All the Light We Cannot See is a magnificent, deeply moving novel from a writer “whose sentences never fail to thrill” (Los Angeles Times)

Anthony Doer talks about the inspiration and investigation
underpinning the story.

The Plot

Marie-Laure, a French girl who has been blind since the age of six lives with her father in Paris near the Museum of Natural History, where he works as the master of its thousands of locks. To help her navigate the local neighbourhood he father builds a perfect miniature so she can memorise it by touch and find her way home. When she is twelve, the Nazis occupy Paris and so they flee to the walled citadel of Saint-Malo, to live with her reclusive great-uncle, bringing with them the invaluable and dangerous jewel from the museum. Meanwhile, in a mining town in Germany, the orphan Werner, enchanted by a crude radio, becomes an expert at building and fixing these new instruments. This leads him to the brutal academy for Hitler Youth. Later he is assigned to locate the radio communications for the French resistance and eventually realises the human suffering his intelligence causes. At Saint-Malo, the lives of Werner and Marie-Laure converge with unexpected consequences.
For those who have not had the pleasure of reading this brilliant novel l would recommend that you find a copy and immerse yourself as soon as possible.

Book trailer introducing the novel: All the Light We Cannot See

Leanne Rands
President CBCA Tasmania