The Halfway Point

So now that you've been reading for a week(ideally), you should be about halfway to 3/4 of the way done. Or maybe, you already finished! In that case, congratulations! If you aren't that far, don't be discouraged -- you still have a week to read The Book Thief. March 10th is the last day for The Book Thief to be featured, but you will still be able to talk about this novel on the forum.

Speaking of which, maybe I didn't explain this properly: to actually join the TBW book club, you need to become a member on the TBW forum. I've noticed that we have been getting tons of visitors(at one point over the weekend we were ranked at #12 on Blogs On Top!!), but I guess everyone is missing the link to the forum on the left over there. (It's right above the poll, people!! Not to mention that it has been linked to in every blog entry.) So go join and chat about The Book Thief, any other book that your little heart desires to discuss, writing and tons of other stuff. Click here to join -- you don't have to buy a membership like some of those other clubs out there, you won't be getting fifteen thousand emails in your box from annoying administrators(ahem), but best of all -- you get to talk about what you love(uh, books. Right?) with other people that share the same interest for reading. So get over there and start talking about The Book Thief!!!

New Discussion Topic: The Theme of Colors, associated with Death
Death is always referencing colors--the colors of the sky, people, souls, etc., but what do they mean? What is he really trying to get at? Death is expressing his feelings. The sky is either red or white, and each one means something different to him or the reader. Sometimes the colors that he talks about are part of Zusak's method of foreshadowing, like the red sky usually means that something bad is going to(or already did) happen, or that people have--what else--died. The colors are the way that death talks about, well, death--to escape from it and to explain it.
So many humans. So many colors. They keep triggering inside me. They harass my memory. I see them tall in their heaps, all mounted on top of each other. There is air like plastic, a horizon of setting glue. There are skies manufactured by people, punctured and leaking, and there are soft, coal-colored black clouds, beating like black hearts.(Zusak, page 309) In this passage, Death is talking about his line of work and the wars that he has to collect the dead from. This little bit almost makes the reader feel bad for him, wandering around all alone, picking up souls . Poor death. Talk about the theme of colors and other discussion topics here.

Tomorrow there will be a new poll up, so be sure to check back for that!

Added Later: I stand corrected. I did not link to the forum in the very first post. (But that was because a) the forum wasn't done--this does take time you know, and b) it had not been established what we were reading yet. So ha.)