The Book Thief pages 31-60

Growing up a Saumensch

Death summarizes Liesel's career of book thievery and mentions that she ended up owning fourteen books.  Liesel has dark brown eyes and blond hair.  She constantly hears the word "Kommunist," but she is too shy to ask anyone what it means.  The Hubermanns lived on Himmel Street with a shallow basement; this was a problem when air strikes started because they always needed to find a better place to hide down the street.  Liesel's foster mother, Rosa Hubermann, was constantly angry and cursing at everything.  She did the laundry and ironing for 5 wealthy homes in the town.  Hans Hubermann, Liesel's foster father, was more gentle.  He was a painter who played the piano and the accordion.  After a few months of living with the Hubermanns, Liesel was expected to start calling them Mama and Papa.

The Woman with the Iron Fist

Liesel would always have nightmares about her deceased brother, but Hans would comfort her every night.  Hans played the accordion for her, against Rosa's hatred for the playing.  Some nights, Liesel would take The Grave Digger's Handbook from under her bed and look at it, not understanding any of the words. She only did this because it gave her a connection to her mother and her brother.  At school, Liesel was forced to learn with the younger children because she knew nothing about how to read or write.  Hans left Liesel and Rosa after breakfast to go to work.  Every day, Rosa would do the ironing for the wealthy families and complain about their laziness.  Rosa would take Liesel on her delivery runs to the houses, where she continued to complain about the people she worked for.  When they returned, Frau Holtzapfel would spit on the doorstep of the Hubermann house.  Rosa and Frau Holtzapfel were enemies for an unknown reason.  Every time this happened, Liesel would go out and clean the spit from the door step.

The Kiss

Rudy Steiner was one of the characters from Liesel's street who would later become her best friend.  Liesel played soccer outside with the other children on the street and she, being the newest member of the soccer group, was forced to be goalie.  One day, Liesel walked with Rudy's family, and Rudy showed Liesel the sights.  They made a stop at a shop that belonged to Frau Diller, who was a very intimidating woman.  Their last stop before school was Rudy's father's tailor shop, where they stopped in and Rudy said hello.  At school, Rudy hung out with Liesel during the breaks, even though his male classmates made fun of him.  One day, Liesel and Rudy decided to have a race.  The conditions were that if Rudy won, he could kiss Liesel, but if Liesel won, Rudy would be goalie for soccer.  They ended up falling in the mud, and called the race a tie.  Liesel refused to kiss Rudy, and vowed that she never would.