How World War Two is Displayed in Each Novel

[melanie]

In All the Light, the author shows to war from both victims and Germans' point of views, how do you think this helps the reader better understand the war? Whereas The Book Thief only showed the war from the German side, do you think the author should have included both sides?

[stefanie]

The author showed the war from both the victims and the Germans' point of views to show that just because people are on opposing sides of war does not make them evil, and that even if one was a German like Werner that they were not any less deserving of second chances, regardless of what they had done. "Frank Volkheimer's third-floor walk-up in the suburbs of Pforzheim, West Germany, possesses three windows. A single billboard, mounted on the cornice of the building across the alley, dominates the view; its surface gleams three yards beyond the glass... He is fifty-one years old" (Doerr 497). The author gave the ex-soldier a second chance to live his life in peace after the war was over to prove that just because he was a German does not mean he did not also deserve peace. The author should not have included both sides in The Book Thief because the novel did not have any German soldiers that would have had an equal major role in the novel as the main character did (unlike Werner and Marie-Laure).