Summary and Analysis
Part 10: The Book Thief:
Confessions
Summary
Liesel tells Rosa and Hans about Max. She stays in bed for three days, and every day Rudy comes to ask for her. On the fourth day, Liesel goes with Rudy to the woods where they once scattered bread for the Jews. She tells him about Max and shows him Rudy's page in The Word Shaker, the picture of Rudy with lemon-colored hair and the medals around his neck. Liesel wants him to kiss her, her best friend who will be dead in a month, but she doesn't ask him to.
Analysis
In this chapter, Liesel and Rudy grow even closer, and Liesel is more aware of how much Rudy means to her. He is her best friend, and she wants to express her love for him, but she still cannot. She does, though, with her words. By letting Rudy know that she told Max about him, he is able to see how much he must mean to her. Rudy made it into her stories. Ironically, this comes just before Rudy's death, so close, in fact, that Death says she was really saying goodbye to Rudy on this day without realizing it.