Quarter 1 SSR

    During the last semester, I read a historical fiction book called All The Lights We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr which consisted of 544 pages in total. Throughout the book there were numerous settings, but the most significant events took place in Germany and Saint Malo during the mid-1930s to WWII. Of the two main characters, there was a blind french girl named Marie-Laure whose father is a locksmith at a museum. The other character is a German orphan named Werner who has an aptitude for engineering and soon becomes a German soldier. Marie-Laure originally lived in Paris, but moved to the city of Saint Malo with her uncle to take refuge from the effects of the Allied bombers and eventually joins the French resistance movement against Nazi occupation by using a radio. During the time, Werner joins a special team that hunts anti-German broadcasters in Saint Malo which causes the two stories to converge. Werner locates the broadcast himself and immediately took a liking to Marie-Laure causing him to save her.

    There were several complications I had with the book. The events were not arranged in chronological order and would often fast forward a couple of years then return to the past which made the book confusing. For example, the book opens up one month after the Allied invasion of Normandy, with Marie-Laure as an adolescent and 18 year old Werner taking cover from the bombings. Then time jumps to 1934, as 6 year old Marie-Laure begins to lose her eyesight and Werner is just a child with an interest in science. Suddenly it’s August 8, 1944 where Marie-Laure makes a pilgrimage to Saint Malo and so forth which I won’t reveal, but it comes long after the major events have transpired. Overall, Doerr has a beautiful writing style which was reflected in each passage and made the reader “see” from Marie-Laure’s perspective as a blind girl during WWII.