Published by Mariner Books on Apr. 4, 2006
Genre(s): Contemporary,Historical, Adult, Fiction
Format: Paperback
Pages: 326
Goodreads
Nine-year-old Oskar Schell is an inventor, amateur entomologist, Francophile, letter writer, pacifist, natural historian, percussionist, romantic, Great Explorer, jeweller, detective, vegan, and collector of butterflies. When his father is killed in the September 11th attacks on the World Trade Centre, Oskar sets out to solve the mystery of a key he discovers in his father's closet. It is a search which leads him into the lives of strangers, through the five boroughs of New York, into history, to the bombings of Dresden and Hiroshima, and on an inward journey which brings him ever closer to some kind of peace.
I liked the story, it was raw and allowed for a different perspective of historical events that I might have never truly been able to understand. I felt that the characters could have been better developed and a couple certain plot lines could have been further explained. Overall, it was a good, easy, and quick read that I very much enjoyed. It was not emotionally draining or anything like what I was expecting. Instead, it was thought provoking and feeling inducing, causing me to reconsider life in general- why and what we live for, things like that. I worried it would be dark and depressing, but even though it centered around a sad and touchy subject for our society, it was so much more than that. It gave me perspective in an unusual way. Like my feelings on the characters, I wish some topics might have been further explored and discussed, as I felt slightly confused at the end. Overall, I quite enjoyed it.
