All the Light We Cannot See - Anthony Doerr

Marie-Laure lives in Paris near the Museum of Natural History, where her father works. When she is twelve, the Nazis occupy Paris and father and daughter flee to the walled citadel of Saint-Malo, where Marie-Laure’s reclusive great uncle lives in a tall house by the sea. With them they carry what might be the museum’s most valuable and dangerous jewel.  

In a mining town in Germany, Werner Pfennig, an orphan, grows up with his younger sister, enchanted by a crude radio they find that brings them news and stories from places they have never seen or imagined. Werner becomes an expert at building and fixing these crucial new instruments and is enlisted to use his talent to track down the resistance. Deftly interweaving the lives of Marie-Laure and Werner, Doerr illuminates the ways, against all odds, people try to be good to one another.

Blurb taken from Goodreads. 

✼

I've had All the Light We Cannot See on my bookshelf for the longest time, and knew I had to try it. As a student of history, I love reading historical fiction. My speciality is actually the period over the world wars, so I thought this would be of particular interest to me. I heard so many great things about this novel before I picked it up.

I have to say, I'm actually quite disappointed. Although I saw elements of beauty in the story, and I enjoyed different elements of the book, I felt that a lot of it was unnecessary. It seemed like the story took way too long to get going, and when it finally did, it was over in a flash. I couldn't help but put the book down feeling really dissatisfied. It's a real shame, because I really expected to love this story. Maybe I hyped it up in my head.

There were lots of things that I thought were good, but it felt like a bit of a chore to get through. 

Rating: ✫✫✫

SPOILER ALERT

The Story

For most of the story, there are two very separate stories, and so I'll talk about them in turn.

Marie-Laure

I thought the use of Marie-Laure was beautiful. The journey of a blind girl through the war is one that I have never come across in fiction, nor have I really had much reason to give many thoughts to. I found the different descriptions of how she was forced to adapt to life really touching.

The whole story around the museum, and the jewel, and Marie-Laure's father's involvement with it was a bit too far for me, especially because I felt it actually had very little importance in the story. The only real significance of it was that it provided the reason for Von Rumpel to be at Etienne's house. Other than that, it is an ongoing saga in the story that has very little bearing on it. 

Marie-Laure's relationship with her Uncle Etienne and Madame Manec is lovely, and I enjoyed reading about their interactions. It is clear that Madame Manec is involved with the anti-war resistance, in however such small ways. There were a lot of different components to her story that I thought were interesting, but it took quite a trek to find the interesting bits amongst the denseness of the rest of the story.

Werner

Werner was an interesting character as well. An orphan, poached to under the nose of the Hitler Youth for his technical skills. Reading about his upbringing and the way he found himself under the regime was really interesting, and I enjoyed learning about how he and the other boys were treated. However, again, it trudged on for far too long with very little progress!

It's a shame, because the use of the radios was key and I found it intriguing. I wondered how it was going to come to be significant. Yet I just could not get into the long and trawling prose. 

Together

When Werner and Marie-Laure came together, I thought it could have made for a really lovely union. And it did. The kindness they showed to each other, even in the briefest of moments, was heart-warming. Werner looked after Marie-Laure, knowing it was likely to end in fatality for him, and it really did show the kindness that people can extend to each other.

But...

Is that it?! Is that actually it? All that build-up, all that back and forth between their stories, between the present and the past, and that's the most we get. I was just so underwhelmed. I put a lot of time and effort into the build up of this story, and it ended as soon as it started to get interesting. I appreciate that the point of the story is to show the kindness that people can extend even in the most fleeting of moments, but it seemed like such a waste of potential. All this build up could have made for something extraordinary, even if is was not supposed to be exciting or flashy. In reality, it fell flat. It wasn't enough.

I think part of the reason I struggled with this book was the constant switching between the past and the present. Normally I'm a really big advocate for that tactic in fiction, as I think it helps keep the narrative interesting. However, it also means that it is essential for the author to distinguish these two different parts of the story. I don't think this was as effective as it could have been in this story. 

Nonetheless, once I did wrap my head around the fact that we were reading not only about Marie-Laure, Werner and Von Rumpel, but their past selves too, I found myself enjoying the different elements more. I think the long drawn out description of their backgrounds was way too much, but I really enjoyed the present day narrative. Well, I didn't find it too interesting to read about Werner, but Marie-Laure's story was exciting and full of anticipation. When Von Rumpel found his way to Etienne's house and she could hear him moving around, I couldn't put the book down. It was really thrilling to know she was trying to go unnoticed; even more so when you remembered that she does not have the ability to react to seeing movement in front of her. I loved these sequences, and the contrasting sections from Von Rumpel's perspective. I just found myself disillusioned on constantly having to go back to more long-winded, largely unnecessary background story.

The Verdict

I really wanted to love this book, and I really expected to as well. I had heard so many wonderful things about it that maybe I hyped it up too much in my head. Although I could see some really beautiful parts of the story, I found a lot of it to be dull and a real slog to get through. 

The constant back and forth between time and characters isn't necessarily a problem, but when you realise you have to go back to a real trudge of description for over 50 pages, it really does not motivate you to continue reading. I loved reading about the present, with Marie-Laure trying to evade Von Rumpel, and Werner hoping to rescue her. But every time I read a little bit of this, I was then forced to go backwards to more long-winded and unnecssary context. It felt like a real chore. 

That being said, I do understand the point of the story. It's meant to show the way the regime affected even those people not entirely and immediately wrapped up in it, and the effect that this had. It also showed the way people can extend kindness and humanity to others, even in the worst of circumstances. I just felt like the amount of background and context was let down by how quick the ending was. I was left feeling disappointed. I really wanted to rate it more, but I just couldn't. A real shame.