Max and Liesel form a close bond. It could be argued that it is because they are similar. What do Max and Liesel have in common that makes them ideal friends?

The characters of Max and Liesel have much in common that makes them well-suited, even ideal, friends. Most obviously, both characters are taken in by the Hubermann family, Hans and Rosa. Both characters have conflicted relationships with the Hubermanns. Both children are dependent on the kindness and charity of the Hubermanns for their very life, which leads both Max and Liesel to struggle with feelings of resentment, guilt, and gratitude. Specifically, Max struggles with guilt that he constantly puts this kind family in danger of Nazi intervention because of his presence hiding in their basement. In a deeper way, both characters have experienced and are shaped by their experiences with familial loss. Max lost his father, and Liesel lost her brother. As readers, we see how both characters struggle with the guilt of living while others die, and they are able to find consolation in each other. In a related way, throughout the novel, both Max and Liesel develop as characters through the themes of power and powerlessness. Liesel feels powerless in her situation, and ultimately words and reading become a way that she finds agency in a world that is out of her control (for example, by stealing books from the Hermanns). Max also struggles with feeling powerless as he hides in the basement, yet he develops his fighting spirit through surviving illness and emotional loss. In these ways, both characters are ideally suited to support one another and become friends.