The most frustrating part about The Book Thief is that it is actually quite an interesting and enjoyable story. It is the writing itself that is laughably idealistic and juvenile.

I was recommended The Book Thief by a number of people, and seeing how highly it was rated by reviewers I was looking forward to something that would challenge me, teach me, or at least give me a fresh point of view on the Second World War. I received none of this. I read a nice story, no doubt. I was never bored with the book; which lead me very succinctly through 554 pages with ease. But, for me, that's where its merits end.

Firstly the format was ridiculous. The fragmented sentencing, trying to create drama by putting each
Element
On
A
New
Line
Was so unnecessary. It wouldn't have been so bad had Zusak applied it when it would actually have been effective, but it turns up in ever chapter.
This combined with the centred, bold snippets, which made out that they were giving the reader a 'special insight', when in fact they were just giving us facts (again, using frayed sentencing) that could have been put much more succinctly within the rest of the text.
Finally, the incorrect use of the dinkus (three asterisks to mark a break in the text) was down right infuriating! Sometimes he uses them as close to four lines before the end of a chapter. What!
Over all, this gave me the impression that Zusak was desperately insecure that his readers would get bored of his writing, so he stuffed the book to the brim with unusual structural elements to keep us going. This did the opposite, and really masked what was, at its heart, an enjoyable story.

As for the characters, well, perhaps with the exception of Rudy and Max Vandenburg, they were all a bit flat. The use of repetition when describing them, which I assume was supposed to make them appear more colloquial and likeable, instead made them seem two dimensional. I still don't know much more about Frau Hubermann than that she cooked terrible pea soup and liked calling people pigs. In 554 pages!

What really got to me about this book however, was the god awful writing. This is the sort of thing I expect to come from an artsy pre-teen with a bloated sense of self confidence, not a professional novelist in his thirties.
Here are just a few examples I noted of Zusak's hilarious misuse of the English language:
'[he] had bony legs, sharp teeth, gangly blue eyes and hair the colour of a lemon.' (Oh don't you just hate it when you have to tuck your eyeballs into your waistband because they're just so GANGLY.)
'She opened her mouth but nothing came out, which was handy really, for it was Liesel who possessed the talking.' (I can see what you're trying to say here, Mr Zusak, but 'possessed the talking' sounds hilarious no matter the context.)
'After a miscarriaged pause' ('miscarriaged' is not a word. Try miscarried and hire a better editor.)
'For me, the sky was the colour of Jews.' (Really? And what colour would that be? A lazy-writing sort of colour?)
'The breakfast-coloured sun.' (Oh, COME ON.)

And if that's not enough to sway you, here's a few of Zusaks 'impactful hard-hitters':
[From the POV of Death] 'You want to know what I truly look like? I'll help you out. Find yourself a mirror while I continue.' (Wow Death, you've got some great tits on you, shame about the acne.)
'They were French, they were Jews, and they were you.' (Eh, you can't blackmail someone into feeling sympathy, that's not how it works.)
'For some reason, dying men always ask questions they know the answer to. Perhaps it's so they can die being right.' (Someone fetch the Australian psychology board and get this man a degree!)
'I have hated the words and I have loved them, and I hope I have made them right.' (Chuuuuuuunder.)
And let's not forget the very final line:
'A last note from your narrator: I am haunted by humans.' (Lucky I read this at the end of the book because it's not soaked in spew.)

I have one final note on the novel's depiction of suffering.
War books are known to be gruelling. Sometimes heartwarming, sometimes heartbreaking, but a good war story is always justifiably poignant. This book is not.
War in The Book Thief is used as a catalyst, and we are consistently told (and never shown) how bad we should be feeling. We are told in advance how terrible everything will be (even who is going to die), how much suffering is going on outside, and we are barely given any historical context. We are effectively floating in a tiny bubble, and the outcome is numbing. Because of this perspective, The Book Thief becomes a nice story, not a powerful one.