Death narrates a girl stealing books in Nazi Germany—and can't put her story down.
Who drives the story
The book thief herself: a foster girl who cannot read when she steals her first book and becomes a writer by the end. She loses her brother, her foster parents, and her best friend, and survives to tell it.
The narrator, overworked and oddly tender, who collects souls and carries one girl's book with him. He is haunted by humans and, in the end, glad he was there.
Liesel's foster father, a house painter and accordionist who teaches her to read at midnight. One piece of bread given to a dying prisoner costs him everything.
The foster mother who washes rich families' laundry and calls Liesel 'Saumensch'—rough words wrapped around fierce love. She is killed in her sleep by the bomb.
The lemon-haired boy who paints himself like Jesse Owens and asks Liesel for a kiss for years. He gets it only when he is dead.
The Jewish fist-fighter hidden in the basement, who turns Mein Kampf's pages into stories for Liesel. He survives the camps and finds her after the war.
Also in the story
The mayor's wife who leaves her library window open for the girl who steals her books. Grief has hollowed her; generosity is her answer.
How they are connected
Liesel's foster father, a house painter and accordionist who teaches her to read at midnight.
The foster mother who washes rich families' laundry and calls Liesel 'Saumensch'—rough words wrapped around fierce love.
The lemon-haired boy who paints himself like Jesse Owens and asks Liesel for a kiss for years.
The Jewish fist-fighter hidden in the basement, who turns Mein Kampf's pages into stories for Liesel.
Go deeper
Words as weapons and shelter · Kindness as defiance · Death's point of view · Love expressed badly
Themes explainedThe full story act by act, the ending explained and a quick quiz.
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