Book Thief, The

It is 1939. Nazi Germany. The country is holding its breath. Death has never been busier, and will become busier still. Liesel Meminger and her younger brother are being taken by their mother to live with a foster family outside Munich. Liesel's father was taken away on the breath of a single, unfamiliar word – Kommunist – and Liesel sees the fear of a similar fate in her mother's eyes. On the journey, Death visits the young boy, and notices Liesel. It will be the first of many near encounters. By her brother's graveside, Liesel's life is changed when she picks up a single object, partially hidden in the snow. It is The Gravedigger's Handbook, left there by accident, and it is her first act of book thievery.So begins a love affair with books and words, as Liesel, with the help of her accordion-playing foster father, learns to read. Soon she is stealing books from Nazi book-burnings, the mayor's wife's library, wherever there are books to be found. But these are dangerous times. When Liesel's foster family hides a Jewish fist-fighter in their basement, Liesel's world is both opened up, and closed down. The Book Thief is a story about the power of words to make worlds. In superbly crafted writing that burns with intensity, award-winning author Markus Zusak has given us one of the most enduring stories of our time.

Formerly a janitor and a high school English teacher, Zusak has rapidly become one of the greatest young authors in Australia since the first publication of his novel in 1999. Reflecting his own life experiences in his books, he tells the stories of other disadvantaged young men struggling against bad circumstances and their own internal demons.  Markus Zusak lives in Sydney with his wife. He has written four novels for young adults: The Underdog, Fighting Ruben Wolfe, When Dogs Cry and The Messenger.  He has been awarded the Older Readers Honor Book of the Year, by the Children's Book Council of Australia (CBCA) in 2001, for Fighting Ruben Wolfe; Older Readers Honor Book of the Year, CBCA, and Young Adult Book of the Year, Queensland Premier's Literary Awards, both 2002, for When Dogs Cry; Older Readers Book of the Year, CBCA, and Ethel Turner Prize, New South Wales Premier's Literary Awards, both 2003, for The Messenger.