7-26-09 The Boy in the Striped Pajamas by John Boyne – Fiction

5 – I’d seen the movie and decided to read the book especially since it seems to turn up on a lot of school reading lists.  The book is completely written through a child’s eyes, no separate explanations to clarify anything he sees.  But as an adult familiar with the history of the time and subtle clues of behavior, so much more is clear to the reader making Bruno’s innocence much clearer and more painful.  His doomed friendship with Shmuel, a boy in the concentration camp behind Bruno’s home, is a joyous example of childhood innocence which makes the end of the story so much worse.  This is a book that will stick with the reader far beyond its end.