Akron Public Library

Death himself narrates the World War II-era story of Liesel Meminger from the time she is taken, at age nine, to live in Molching, Germany, with a foster family in a working-class neighborhood of tough kids, acid-tongued mothers, and loving fathers who earn their living by the work of their hands. The child arrives having just stolen her first bookalthough she has not yet learned how to readand her foster father uses it, The Gravediggers...

When his foster father, a wealthy merchant and bookseller, finances Johann Gutenberg and his printing press, Peter Schoeffer is ordered to become Gutenberg's apprentice and begins his education in the "darkest art" as they print copies of the Holy Bible, drawing the wrath of the Church.

Although they are able to escape Hitler's Germany, Leah and Louis are unable to find a country which will take them in.

Leah and little Louis attempt to escape Austria over treacherous foot paths in the Alps while Murphy and Elisa begin their trip toward New York. While Jewish refugees from Germany float on the open seas, Elisa stands precariously between Hitler's domination of Europe and the possibility of destroying his power once and for all.

"The New York Times-bestselling author of A Fierce Radiance and City of Light returns with a new powerful and passionate novel--inspired by historical events--about two women, one European and one American, and the mysterious choral masterpiece by Johann Sebastian Bach that changes both their lives. In the ruins of Germany in 1945, at the end of World War II, American soldier Henry Sachs takes a souvenir, an old music manuscript, from a seemingly...