All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr is this year’s Omaha Reads selection.
The book was published in May 2014 and won the 2015 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction and the 2015 Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Fiction.
Emily Getzschman, Marketing Manager for the Omaha Public Library, says the library opened up the Omaha Reads competition at the beginning of the year and asked visitors to nominate their favorite books for consideration.
From the nominations, the library staff narrowed down the selections to five and people were asked to vote for their favorite.
Getzschman says the book is about two main characters: a blind French girl and a young German boy who is assimilated into the Hitler youth army.
"So it follows their stories through WWII but it also brings in so many other characters. The cast in this book is so rich and so well developed. And it goes to show, in the story, there were no winners and there was nowhere to hide for anyone. So no matter what side of the war you were on, there was no good outcome for anyone.”
Getzschman says the library will hold some special programs that cover themes within the book, including a presentation called “The Importance of Radio in Nazi Germany and Occupied France” on Thursday, September 8th at 6:30 p.m.
There is no charge for any of the library’s programming. For more information on reserving your copy of All the Light We Cannot See, the website is omahalibrary.org.