6. The Book Thief by Markus Zusak (2005). Not sure how I feel about this one. It kept me reading all the way through its considerable length, yet I can't drum up any particular enthusiasm for it. It's the story of Liesel Meminger, a young girl taken to live with an adoptive family in a small German town in 1939, and who (as the title suggests) develops a habit of stealing books. The novel follows the lives of Liesel, her new parents (who come to hide a Jew in their basement) and other people in her street; until, several years and a few hundred pages later, the war catches up.

Certainly The Book Thief has its moments, and Zusak makes his central points (that human beings have an equal capacity for 'beauty and brutality', and both could be found in Nazi Germany) effectively enough. But I'm not convinced that some of the novel's 'quirks' -- such as being narrated by death, and having little 'asides' printed in bold -- really add all that much. This is one of the books for my reading group next month, and I'll be interested to hear what other people make of it; as for me, I'm still unsure whether reading it is worth the necessary investment of time.

7. History Today, February 2008. I've subscribed to History Today for several years, but it's rare that I manage to sit down and read an issue from cover to cover -- but, this month, I did. Oddly enough, it was some of the shorter pieces in between the main articles that I enjoyed most. Mark Knights from Warwick University writes about the possibilities that digital technology brings to the practice and study of history which, as a history graduate, I found interesting.



Elsewhere in the magazine, journalist Jason Burke reminded me of something which I think is very true: that whilst in the UK, we might view history as 'merely something to be studied', in other parts of the world, it can be 'heavily involved in defining personal identity'; and Janet Voke tells the fascinating story of how Norway's royal family and gold reserves were evacuated to Britain in 1940 (which, I never realised, is why Norway gives Britain a Christmas tree for Trafalgar Square every year).