On My Kindle At the Moment - And One That Isn't Anymore

It's always the innocents that take the brunt in war. The poor, the children, the animals.  In the novel, All the Light We Cannot See, Anthony Doerr creates for us two innocents with an extraordinary story amid the upheaval of war.  Both children around the age of 16, Marie-Laure is a blind French girl, and Werner, a young German boy will intersect shortly after the Normandy invasion in the city of Saint-Malo.  

One chapter hers, the next his, we will see how events bring them together.  She flees  with her father who is a locksmith for the Museum of Natural History in Paris when the Germans invade, to Saint Malo where her Uncle has a house.  Werner is an orphan who has a gift to understand radio waves and repair who is sent to a German training school to utilize these gifts.  The title, of course, is emblematic of the things they both are able to see without it being outwardly visible.  

If you are looking for action at breakneck speed, go rent the Die Hard series on DVD.  Doerr has a story to tell, and takes his time telling it.  It isn't slow, but I found myself wishing events would happen a little faster so we could get to the mystery that is at the crux story.  My only quibble is that the story is not linear.  Linear is easier, it's less jarring.  We go back in time then return to present with a great deal of frequency so brace yourself.  I'm a lazy reader, I want start to finish.  A to B.  

Even with that, however, All The Light We Cannot See is a beautifully written novel that tells a great story about two kids we really like.  Aside from the History Channel's guns blazing and planes flying, the real story of war are the innocent people, the children, who become part of the Hell not of their choosing but because they are at the wrong place at the wrong time.  The real story of war isn't just an event like D-Day, it's the years of   struggle and survival by kids like Marie-Laure and Werner, and the adults around them who help or hinder.  

Finally, the heart of the story is what Marie-Laure's father places in a model of the town she lives in (so she can imagine in her mind where she lives and how to walk from place to place without him) and is in her bedroom.  Ultimately it is a minor thing, but is the center of every one's behavior and action in the book.  Well developed characters, this isn't always easy, it is no beach read, but it is worth it and will wriggle around in you brain after you read it, and next there for a long time.  

Side note -  I tried reading a well regarded novel by Neil Gaiman, Ocean at the End of the Lane, but figurativly threw it in the garbage.  I found it disjointed, hard to follow, nonsensical, and boring.  It was supposed to be magical, but Gaiman couldn't pull the rabbit out of the hat fast enough for my taste.  I don't have a particular page number when I jettison a book, and I'll stay with it if I think the payoff will be worth it, but, my heavens, this was just too obscure for me.  

It's on my Kindle so I suppose I could, at some point, perhaps my deathbed, try to finish it.  At least that way my condition and future won't seem as bleak as the book I'm trying to finish.  

Any more analysis on that would be futile because my brain has thankfully forgotten the whole mess, much like the pain of childbirth I am told.  

Things did improve with All the Things We Cannot See after the Gaiman debacle.  I am almost finished with The Dog Stars 
 and have the non-fiction arctic exploration The Ice Kingdom lined up next, then a friend recommended Signature Of All Things.