All the Light We Cannot See ~ Anthony Doerr

★★★★★

All your life you wait, and then it finally comes, and are you ready?

This book is unique in a way that means a lot to me. Not only does it showcase the horrors of World War II through the life of Marie-Laure; the awful destruction, cruelty of the Nazis, and the terrible way memories change people. It also shows the war from the other side; from the side of Werner, a Nazi soldier, who is a hero in his own right, and a deeply sympathetic character. This storyline is what I will primarily focus on in this review because it is deeply personal to me.

My uncle was a man not dissimilar to Volkheimer, Werner's friend and comrade in the war. He was tall, strong, passionate, and kind, liked by all who met him. He was unfortunate enough to be those things in a time of great social turmoil and political upheaval. He was a supersoldier in Chile during the dictatorship of Pinochet, and because of the things he did, he changed. He still lives, but he is a shell of his former self, a lost man. But he is not a bad man.

This book does an amazing job of humanizing the war and its people. The Germans are, as a whole, no better or worse than the French. They are painfully and undeniably human. They are afraid. They are lost. They are doing what they think will keep them safe. And, most importantly, they are holding onto hope. Some might do awful things, horrible things, and they, to survive, will try to distance themselves from those things. But, like my uncle, they are not bad people.