Eventually, Werner goes to a select technical school and then, at 18, into the Wehrmacht, where his technical aptitudes are recognized and he’s put on a team trying to track down illegal radio transmissions. Through flashbacks we learn that Werner had been a curious and bright child who developed an obsession with radio transmitters and receivers, both in their infancies during this period. Parallel to the story of Marie-Laure we meet Werner and Jutta Pfennig, a brother and sister, both orphans who have been raised in the Children’s House outside Essen, in Germany. He also crafted clever and intricate boxes, within which treasures could be hidden. Marie-Laure’s father was a locksmith and craftsman who made scale models of cities that Marie-Laure studied so she could travel around on her own. She’s taken refuge in this city with her great-uncle Etienne, at first a fairly frightening figure to her. D-Day took place two months earlier, and Cherbourg, Caen and Rennes have already been liberated. In August 1944, Marie-Laure LeBlanc is a blind 16-year-old living in the walled port city of Saint-Malo in Brittany and hoping to escape the effects of Allied bombing. Doerr presents us with two intricate stories, both of which take place during World War II late in the novel, inevitably, they intersect.
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