All the Light We Cannot See: A Novel
Written by Anthony Doerr
Narrated by Zach Appelman
4.5/5
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About this audiobook
*NOW A NETFLIX LIMITED SERIES—from producer and director Shawn Levy (Stranger Things) starring Mark Ruffalo, Hugh Laurie, and newcomer Aria Mia Loberti*
Winner of the Pulitzer Prize and National Book Award finalist, the beloved instant New York Times bestseller and New York Times Book Review Top 10 Book about a blind French girl and a German boy whose paths collide in occupied France as both try to survive the devastation of World War II.
Marie-Laure lives with her father in Paris near the Museum of Natural History where he works as the master of its thousands of locks. When she is six, Marie-Laure goes blind and her father builds a perfect miniature of their neighborhood so she can memorize it by touch and navigate her way home. 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, the orphan Werner grows up with his younger sister, enchanted by a crude radio they find. Werner becomes an expert at building and fixing these crucial new instruments, a talent that wins him a place at a brutal academy for Hitler Youth, then a special assignment to track the Resistance. More and more aware of the human cost of his intelligence, Werner travels through the heart of the war and, finally, into Saint-Malo, where his story and Marie-Laure’s converge.
Doerr’s “stunning sense of physical detail and gorgeous metaphors” (San Francisco Chronicle) are dazzling. Deftly interweaving the lives of Marie-Laure and Werner, he illuminates the ways, against all odds, people try to be good to one another. Ten years in the writing, All the Light We Cannot See is a magnificent, deeply moving novel from a writer “whose sentences never fail to thrill” (Los Angeles Times).
Editor's Note
One of the best of the decade…
Anthony Doerr’s Pulitzer Prize-winning novel is sensational — the rare book that takes a well-worn subject and adds an unforgettable spin. It follows the twin narratives of Marie-Laure, a blind French girl, and Werner, a German orphan recruited to the military, at the height of WWII. The story is haunting, the imagery of war-torn France beautiful, and the characters so rich in depth that devouring the entire book feels inevitable.
Anthony Doerr
ANTHONY DOERR is the author of the Pulitzer Prize–winning novel All the Light We Cannot See. He is also the author of the two story collections Memory Wall and The Shell Collector, the novel About Grace, and the memoir Four Seasons in Rome. He has won four O. Henry Prizes, the Rome Prize, the New York Public Library’s Young Lions Award, the National Magazine Award for fiction, a Guggenheim Fellowship, and the Story Prize. Doerr lives in Boise, Idaho, with his wife and two sons.
More audiobooks from Anthony Doerr
The Best American Short Stories 2019 Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Cloud Cuckoo Land: A Novel Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Four Seasons in Rome: On Twins, Insomnia, and the Biggest Funeral in the History of the World Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5About Grace: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
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Reviews for All the Light We Cannot See
8,677 ratings629 reviews
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5This book was amazing! Such a heartwarming, adventurous story. Must read!!
1 person found this helpful
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5“Open your eyes and see what you can with them before they close forever.” ~Anthony Doerr, All the Light We Cannot See
It is the story of a blind French girl, Marie-Laure LeBlanc who lives with her father near the Museum of Natural History, Paris, France where her father works and a German boy, Werner Pfennig with his younger sister Jutta that are raised at Children’s House, an orphanage near a mining complex outside of Essen, Germany. Marie-Laure and Werner’s paths collide in occupied Saint-Malo, France as both try to survive the devastation of World War II.
The two stories are interwoven and seamlessly flow back and forth between the days of their lives. It is an extraordinary and deeply moving novel that will stay in the mind and heart of this reader.1 person found this helpful
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5All the Light We Cannot See tells the stories leading up to the encounter of a blind French girl, Marie-Laure, and a German orphan, Werner, during World War II. It's a long book, but the chapters are short and keeps it moving, and the characters are well written. You get a feel for them (emotions, personality, etc), the setting, and the events taking place. Anthony Doerr really knows how to write.
Both characters start off as children before WWII but both can sense a change in their everyday life that leads to war. Marie-Laure lives in Paris with her father who works at a museum. they have to leave Paris with what might be the Sea of Flames, a diamond that is believed to be cursed causing the holder to live forever while the people closest suffer. They go to Saint Malo to stay with Marie's great uncle. Werner becomes fascinated with radios and able to fix any problem that comes up with one, he catches the attention of the German army and enters into the most prestigious school to train. He sees what is happening, doesn't like it morally but participates. He is pulled from school to track illegal radio broadcast for the German army and it leads him to Saint Malo. He has already seen the effects of war and is questioning what he has been told and has to decide if he is going to continue doing as he is told and expected or listen to his mind and hear. The book goes back and forth between the characters childhood and both of them being trapped somewhere in Saint Malo in different places, where eventually their stories come together. The book is so beautifully written, the pace is good, especially considering how long the book is, but the chapters make it fly by. It's a book you can settle into and get lost in.1 person found this helpful
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Yep, I thought it was just okay. It took forever to get to the point. It was beautifully written, but just dragged.
1 person found this helpful
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Beautifully told story. Heart wrenching detail about children surviving war.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5G o o o o o o o o d
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5I thought it was well written, and the characters were engaging, but the ending? It was so uneventful, such a letdown, after such an engaging story.
- Rating: 1 out of 5 stars1/5Look, the scattershot approach to the timeline of the book would have been bad enough, but then you have two characters questioning if resisting the Nazis is a good thing, and it's utterly exasperating.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Beautifully written and heartbreaking to read. As the years go by, we tend to forget what our not-so-distant relatives suffered through.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Beautifully written and my heart hurt for all the misery of war.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5I read the book because I thought the show didn’t properly convey Werner’s and Marie’s relationship, I wanted to see it done well. I didn’t really get that, the description says ‘Weaves their stories together masterfully’ I guess, but only for one chapter.
I was bored most of the way through. Didn't finish it even. Mentions of prostitution(among other things) and some slightly inappropriate things(results may vary). - Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Beautifully written. I won’t stop thinking of all these tender characters for a long time.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Very well written but about an overarching subject thats been overdone. I’m excited to read some of his other books though.
- Rating: 1 out of 5 stars1/5I could not finish the book because I fell asleep and it finished. Now it will not replay. So frustrating.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5A wonderful story. Great characters and Magically woven together. Everyone should read.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5It was so real at every turn! I want to listen again, such a rare desire…..
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5This a hauntingly beautiful novel that I will return to again and again.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5This is a truly wonderful story of the lives of people on both sides of the war. The reader is made to feel the struggles , the pain , the fear and loneliness of each of its characters. We feel the futility of war for all involved. The author’s character sketches of each person we are introduced to is fascinating and complete. This is not so much, to me, a story of events, as it is a story of humanity.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Probably the best book I've ever read. Probably isn't needed I suppose. I cry or think about crying every time I read it and always remember how I felt and where I was when I first finished it. I was left dumbfounded and hurt and could find no one around to share how I felt about it upon minutes after finishing it. Maybe that's appropriate.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5I LOVED this book. I imagine that it will be on my top five favorite books read in 2014 list.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The novel is amazing despite the fact that not only is a novel but is a storyteller too,and eventally story goes one really surprisingly,because it shows the story of 2 young people where there paths were crossed in occupied france which is that this makes novel really essential.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5this novel is so good, this book is highly recommended to read!!
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5A deep dive into what might have been the personal and intrapersonal experience of insignificant participants in the WII assault at St Marlo.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5This is the story of a blind French girl and a young, naive German boy who through the course of WWII endure hardships, grow up, and eventually meet. There are many sub-plots which are well-developed. This isn't a story of WWII, per say, the war is only the background to the story. The book is very well written and keeps you on the edge of your seat. I'm not an easy one to impress, but this author did it. The characters are beautifully developed. This is one of the books that "haunts" you. I can see why it was a Pulitzer Prize winner. The reader comes away from the book with the lesson that there are no victors in war.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A little hard to follow as an audiobook. Wonderful story! I would recommend this, but with a physical copy if possible.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The stories of the individual lives dealing with such a horrific war were both awe inspiring as well shocking- the bravery, love, passion and fortitude of the main characters was an emotional upheaval and was a tiny example of so many people’s reality
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5This was simply amazing. Doerr really knows how to tell a good story.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The type of book you’ll listen to every six months and be held captivated upon revisiting every single time. The characters are unmet and unlike anyone I will ever meet. I feel like i’m relearning the world through what I have never seen. which i am lol!
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Do yourself a favor and read this one. Perfect performance too.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5sobbing, screaming, thrashing! how can i recover from this????? :(