“One afternoon, when Bruno came home from school, he was surprised to find Maria, the family’s maid — who always kept her head bowed and never looked up from the carpet — standing in his bedroom, pulling all his belongings out of the wardrobe and packing them in four large wooden crates, even the things he’d hidden at the back that belonged to him and were nobody else’s business.”

From John Boyne’s The Boy in the Striped Pajamas.

9-year-old Bruno enjoys his life; mischief and adventure follow him everywhere and life is wonderful until his parents announces that they are moving.  Bruno does absolutely, positively, definitely not want to leave his family, friends, and amazing house in Berlin, but because his father is a prominent German officer (who has big things ahead of him) the family moves.  The family trades their gorgeous five-story mansion in Berlin for a small, rundown house at “Out-With.”  Bruno is heartbroken, because where there were loads of people and children to play with in Berlin, there is no one around this new house… except for the people that live on the other side of the fence.  While he can see them through the window in his bedroom, Bruno doesn’t know anything about them, except that the people all wear striped pajamas.  The constant coming and going of German soldiers becomes Bruno’s new normal and even though he has an older sister, Bruno is left without anyone to play with; that is, until Bruno decides to take a walk along the fence and meets a boy from the opposite side named Shmuel.  Even though they are stuck on different sides of fence and different opinions about life, a friendship quickly develops for the two 9-year-olds.  Bruno’s world is constantly changing around him while at “Out-With,” but he never quite seems to be able to see the whole picture; all he knows for sure is that Shmuel is becoming his best friend.

Boyne’s novel is very simple, but that is what makes it so captivating.  Bruno’s narration style is simple and innocent, but filled with heart and questions for the readers to ask themselves; his mispronunciation of words like “Auschwitz” and “Führer” help keep this child’s innocence at the center of our attention.  The book is a masterful balance of not-fully-revealed information and raw emotion, a read that could easily be too intense of a story line for some readers.  It is a very quick read, but The Boy in the Striped Pajamas is a story that will stick with the reader for years to come.