Book Review:ALL THE LIGHT WE CANNOT SEE by midhat qamar

Andrew Doerr pulls a near realistic sketch of the events of the Second World War, choosing captivating characters as important leads.

Marie-Laure is a French, blind girl who is smart and quick-witted.

Werner pfennig is a German boy, an orphan possessing a brilliant mind.

Both enter the Second World War as innocent youths. What lies ahead for them, how the war begins to change their lives and the lives of the ones around them, and how they are gently brought together where they find solace in one another is a narrative that begs to be read.

As the War, violent and thunderous in its being, creeps into the life of Marie-Laure, she, with her father are uprooted from their wonderful house in France and like all others, are forced to trudge upon the difficult journey of finding shelter where the fists of War are slightly less powerful, where they may be able to find a little ounce of peace, and may be some faith that things might be better one day. Their fate awaited them while they hoped for stability to come into their lives again.

Werner Pfennig, on the other side, the side that was among the rivals of Marie-Laure’s country, the German side, becomes a free-lancing radio repairman from a very young age. Every time a radio sputters and delivers static or goes silent, he is summoned by the people around him. His capabilities do not go unnoticed and soon after, he finds himself part of the War, inventing transceivers and fixing radios and what not. His fate too, awaited him.

The author has masterfully broken down the mechanics of the most vital invention of that time, the radio-an invention, which was extensively used in the War. But Doerr does not stop just there. Between his writing, the readers, especially ones who love to delve into the recesses of the science of things would find that the simplest of things have been described in such a way as to give them an entirely different, delightful nonetheless, perspective.

However, more than that, what will strike the reader, is the War’s by-products and the consequences amounting to an unimaginable degree, Doerr has done an outstanding job of portraying what needed to be portrayed to the world. His writing speaks of the barbarianism, and the bitter reality that war really is. At the same time, it implores the reader to find the light that we do not see in harsh, unforgiving times and to not unleash weapons of destruction and give up whatever light there is.

It is a compelling read, almost poetic and a metaphorical masterpiece, one that is highly recommended.