Being a book lover, I always read the book before the movie. But much to my sadness, I didn’t know that The Book Thief was a book until long after I first watched the movie. But as soon as I found out, I knew I had to read it. recently my book club chose it as our book for the month, I was so excited.
Let me start with the book. The books follow Liesel and it’s from the perspective of death… the grim reaper… however you want to refer to it. I felt the perspective of the book definitely allowed for more of an emotional story. While the movie was definitely emotional at parts, I felt things way more strongly while reading the book. This doesn’t surprise me because I usually feel more when reading books. I also loved the details in the book that you don’t get from the movie. Obviously there are going to be more details because there isn’t a time limit, but in this case I feel that the details really added something to the story. The characters were far more detailed and I find that the mom and dad had slightly different descriptions than how they were portrayed in the film. I really liked the added details of the little things the dad did for Leisel that made their relationship that much more endearing.
The reason I love the film so much is because I like how it showed a different view of Hitler’s reign than from the war standpoint. These were real lives of people that had to live in Hitler’s territory whether they agreed with him or not. It gave a visual portrayal of their fear when searches were done and the fear when raid sirens went off. The book also offered this, but I think sometimes the visual that a movie gives you really puts it in a new perspective. The acting was also incredible and I loved all the actors cast.
Either way you look at The Book Thief, you can’t lose. The film is great. The book is great. Both tell an amazing story of ordinary life during one of the worst times in the world’s history. I would highly recommend both to everyone.
You can pick up your copy of The Book Thief by Markus Zusak on Amazon HERE or pick up a copy of the film HERE.