Markus Zusak, the author of The Book Thief and Anthony Doerr, the author of All The Light We Cannot See both wrote award-winning novels that took place in the World War II setting. Each of these novels have their own ways of including symbolism, foreshadowing, and flashback. While reading each of these books, readers may be able to make many connections with each of Doerr’s and Zusak’s characters. Their novels may be similar, but the way they were produced is very different. Even though Markus Zusak and Anthony Doerr’s inspirations differ, their background and personal experiences influence their motivations for writing.
Markus Zusak got to put himself in the shoes of his parents while listening to their childhood stories that influenced him to write some of the parts that took place in his novel. Zusak’s story was very much inspired by the stories he grew up hearing from his parents. The Book Thief was written at an angle that people rarely see, that of ordinary German people living under the Nazi regime (Interview with Markus Zusak, Author of The Book Thief and I Am the Messenger). Having a mother that was German and a father that was Austrian, those stories played a big role in his writing. Zusak exclaimed in one of his interviews:
One of my mum’s stories was about something that happened when she was six. She heard a noise that sounded like cattle being herded down the street. It was people being herded to a concentration camp. There was an old man who couldn’t keep