All the Light We Cannot See
To shut your eyes is to guess nothing of blindness. Beneath your world of skies and faces and buildings exists a rawer and older world, a place where surface planes disintegrate and sounds ribbon in shoals through the air.
I really love reading WWII historical fiction. There is just something about that time that really interests me. I think it is the courage and bravery that people had during the war. So when I saw that this was a book about WWII and that it had a character in it that was blind, I had never read a book from the perspective of a blind person, I knew that I really wanted to read this. After reading it I am conflicted about my rating and review of it. I kept going back and forth between 3.5 and 4 stars but ultimately I chose 3.5.
One thing that I really enjoyed about this book was the characters. I feel like Doerr did a really good job fleshing out the characters and really allowing readers to see what drives each of the characters. The book has two main characters, Marie-Laure and Werner, but it also switches point-of-view between other characters in the book. Some characters I grew to love, others I sympathized with, and a few I pitied. I was interested in all the characters, there was not one in which I felt like I wanted to skip their parts.
I didn't like the pacing of this book. This book actually felt long to me. While it was important for readers to be introduced to the characters I felt like the first half really dragged on. This book also jumps around in time and towards the end it became a bit confusing to me because the time periods became closer.
The last 20% of this book was magnificent. I felt such a range of emotions while reading it. I was in tears for most of it but I also had some anger and happiness. The ending is a little bit of a roller coaster but it is a beautifully written and satisfying roller coaster.
If you are a fan of WWII historical fiction that will probably leave you crying at the end I would definitely recommend this book to you. Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the galley.
4
