To be honest, I was half skeptical when I first read the synopsis of “All The Light We Cannot See” for I thought to myself, ‘How different could another World War Two story be?’ But I was happily proven otherwise because this 2015 Pulitzer Prize winner by Anthony Doerr is an absolute stunner.
War is arguably an institutional feature in the international society, a description that devoid of emotions and conjures up images of men in suits, negotiating tables and marching soldiers. This book takes war out of the hands of adults and thrusts them into that of children, blind French girl Marie-Laure and orphaned German boy Warner.
It maps the divergent paths they took during the Second World War, a period where they experience drastic changes and the pains of growing up. They were confronted with difficult decisions that people around them were making, but unknown to them was that these decisions were mainly made to shelter them from the harsh realities that were unfolding. In the years to come, these moments would continue haunt them for the rest of their lives. Continue reading