This book actually didn't go anywhere I thought it would go, and not in a good way. Based on the title and all the hype around it, I thought the story would be super compelling. I thought that maybe she was stealing Torah's and giving them to Jews before these books were burned or something. That would have been a much more interesting story. I don't even truly understand the title of this book. Liesel, the main character, only steals about three books in the course of the story. She doesn't really have things in particular that she likes to do and lacks a personality overall. We are told that she likes to read and she is taught how to read by her foster father, but that's about as much of a personality trait as she's given. My favorite part of the book was probably Liesel's best friend, Rudy. He's very excitable and ends up developing feelings for Liesel. He's flirty and playful with her and has a very distinct personality that is entertaining and humorous. I think what annoyed me the most is that we are told who will die and often the type of death certain characters will have at the very beginning of the book. Then, when we actually get to parts of the book that are supposed to be shocking and emotional, they lose their shock value because the revelation was given at the beginning of the book. It really is anti climactic and the ending was unrealistic and unemotional because of it. I didn't feel upset or sad, just ticked off because the story wants to try and get the reader to feel for characters that aren't really worth feeling for or wants the reader to be surprised about things that they were told at the beginning of the book. The narration was interesting since the story is narrated by death. However, due to all the unnecessary spoilers and German vocabulary that is immediately afterwards defined in English (defeating the purpose), it got repetitive very quickly. I don't think this is a horrible book, by any means, but it was so ordinary that I fail to understand how it won awards and such. I've read much better books, honestly. I own a paperback copy, but this book is definitely going off of my "worth owning" list. I'd say it's maybe worth borrowing, and even that is doubtful.