Through luminous prose and dextrous characterisation, All the Light We Cannot See paints a transcendent picture of love and companionship during the Nazi occupation of France.
Winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction 2015
A beautiful, stunningly ambitious novel about a blind French girl and a German boy whose paths collide in occupied France as both try to survive the devastation of World War II
Open your eyes and see what you can with them before they close forever.
For Marie-Laure, blind since the age of six, the world is full of mazes. The miniature of a Paris neighbourhood, made by her father to teach her the way home. The microscopic layers within the invaluable diamond that her father guards in the Museum of Natural History. The walled city by the sea, where father and daughter take refuge when the Nazis invade Paris. And a future which draws her ever closer to Werner, a German orphan, destined to labour in the mines until a broken radio fills his life with possibility and brings him to the notice of the Hitler Youth.
In this magnificent, deeply moving novel, the stories of Marie-Laure and Werner illuminate the ways, against all odds, people try to be good to one another.
Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers
ISBN: 9780008138301
Number of pages: 544
Weight: 370 g
Dimensions: 198 x 129 x 34 mm
'Far more than a conventional war story, It's a tightly focused epic … Doerr paints with a rich palette, using prose that resonates deeply and conveys the ephemera of daily existence along with high drama, sadness and hope … A bittersweet and moving novel that lingers in the mind' Daily Mail ‘An epic work about bravery and the power of attachment’ Rose Tremain, Observer, Books of the Year ‘An epic and a masterpiece’ Justin Cartwright, Observer ‘This novel will be a piece of luck for anyone with a long plane journey or beach holiday ahead. It is such a page-turner, entirely absorbing… magnificent’ Guardian ‘Doerr can bring a scene to life in a single paragraph … Delicate and moving … the novel takes hold and will not easily let go’ The Times ‘Boy meets girl in Anthony Doerr’s hauntingly beautiful new book, but the circumstances are as elegantly circuitous as they can be’ The New York Times ‘I’m not sure I will read a better novel this year … Enthrallingly told, beautifully written and so emotionally plangent that some passages bring tears’ Washington Post ‘This jewel of a story is put together like a vintage timepiece … Doerr’s writing and imagery are stunning. It’s been a while since a novel had me under its spell in this fashion.’ Abraham Verghese ‘A dazzling, epic work of fiction. Anthony Doerr writes beautifully about the mythic and the intimate, about snails on beaches and armies on the move, about fate and love and history and those breathless, unbearable moments when they all come crashing together.’ Jess Walter
Oh dear. I'm afraid I'm badly out of step with the rave reviews because I didn't like this novel. It's a decent idea and has its moments, but for me the story and characters were constantly swamped... More
This novel has received rave reviews and for once, the hype is justified. Words such as magnificent, wonderful, sublime, magical and compelling do this novel justice and still can't adequately sum up how great... More
I thoroughly enjoyed this book - didn't want it to end. I'm not sure what to read next as I know the next book won't compare to this. Thoroughly captivating and evocative.
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