Saimt- Malo is occupied by German forces and under siege by the Allied bombers that destroyed much of it before the war was over and five streets away from the house to which Marie-Laure and her father have fled a young German soldier named Werner Pfennig is trapped in the ruins of a grand hotel.Long before werner and Marie-Laure meet, Doerr has created a skein of ties between them
Marie-Laure grows up beloved and fortunate; Werner's life is more grim. He is close to his sister, Jutta, but both are consighed to an orphanage after their father is crushed in a coal mine.