For the 2010 "Read Together Palm Beach County" campaign, almost 3,000 area book lovers have reached back to Nazi Germany in 1939, to choose a title they hope will steal readers' hearts this year.
They also made local history by choosing, for the first time, a young adult novel for the "One Book, One Community" project.
"The Book Thief," a 2005 novel by Australian author Markus Zusak, is the story of 9-year-old Liesel Meminger, who falls in love with reading when she finds a "Grave Digger's Handbook" buried in the snow by her brother's grave. Soon she is stealing books wherever possible and sharing them with a Jew her family is hiding in their basement. In a mordant twist, the novel is narrated by Death.
The widely praised book beat out Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet by Jamie Ford, The Things They Carried by Tim O'Brien, Run by Ann Patchett and The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Shaffere and Annie Barrows in voting at local libraries, bookstores and Starbucks coffee shops.
A winner of the Book Sense award for children's literature and a School Library Journal Best Book of the Year, The Book Thief has spent 123 weeks on The New York Times children's bestseller list.
"Now we want everyone to come up with ways to engage your employees, friends and co-workers in discussion groups," said Darlene Kostrub, chief executive officer of the Palm Beach County Literacy Coalition.
The official reading campaign will kick off March 26 and end April 30.
For more information, call the Palm Beach County Literacy Coalition at 1-800-273-1030 or visit www.literacypbc. org.
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