I read this because I assigned Nicole Krauss' History of Love as a summer reading assignment, and this book was mentioned in pretty much every review of that book. The two books do share some similarities (both are about a child investigating a mystery of their dead father and both mix traditional narrative storytelling with piecemeal excerpts of letters/journals/etc.) but I think Foer's effort was not nearly as good as his wife's. The parts of the books told from Oskar's point of view are remarkable. Foer perfectly captures the voice of an intelligent, curious, and shellshocked little boy. The other parts of the book, consisting of letters written by Oskar's grandparents and the occasional scrapbook photograph aren't nearly as engaging. The way Foer uses simple, declarative sentences to try to capture the voice of Oskar's immigrant grandmother quickly grows tiresome. And I'm honestly not sure what to think about the use of 9/11 in the book. At times, it seems entirely essential to both the plot and to establishing aspects of Oskar's character. At other times, especially when Foer is inserting photographs of the falling man, the use of 9/11 seems designed to shoehorn in an extra layer of sadness to the story.