All the Light We Cannot See

by Anthony Doerr

Goethe

byzantine

Mauser

The star-flooded nights, the dew-soaked dawns, the hushed ambulatories, the enforced asceticism—never has Werner felt part of something so single-minded. Never has he felt such a hunger to belong. In the rows of dormitories are cadets who talk of alpine skiing, of duels, of jazz clubs and governesses and boar hunting; boys who employ curse words with virtuosic skill and boys who talk about cigarettes named for cinema stars; boys who speak of “telephoning the colonel” and boys who have baronesses for mothers.

Jungmänner.

soldering

grebe.

gemologist

inlaid

prelate

caviste

interminable

From the kitchen window comes the wit wit wit of a barn swallow, footfalls on ramparts, halyards clinking against masts, hinges and chains creaking in the harbor. Ghosts. Germans. Snails.

ohmmeter?”

gendarmes

rheas

Patagonia,

bioluminescent

indolent.

poplar

gable

gramophone.