In the beginning of this book there is a boy named Bruno. He was nine years old and his dad worked some where he never knew about. One day Bruno and his family had to move to another house. Outside of Bruno’s window there was people working. There was brown grass and everything looked absolutely horrible. The people working wore blue and grey striped pajamas. He wanted to know more.
Bruno went to tell his older sister Gretel about it. She didn’t believe him so she went to see for herself. She couldn’t even describe how bad it was. So Bruno goes down to ask his father why it looks like that. His father just told him that they were the maids and that they were making the house better. So he asked him the question that his father did not want to answer. “Why can’t we go back home?’’

Throughout the story Bruno meet a little boy. His name is Shmuel. He is also nine years old. He came up with a little plan. He decided that he and Bruno were going to switch families for a little while. Bruno wanted to see how they lived and Shmuel wanted to see how they live. So they did the one thing that could change everything.

In the end of the story it turns out that Bruno’s dad was working for Hitler. He didn’t tell Bruno because he didn’t want him to be scared. While Bruno was with Shmuels family he was going to kill them. They weren’t doing what he asked him to do so it only seemed fair. What he didn’t realize was that his son was with them. So he told his people to go get them and tell them they were going to take a shower. Since they usually didn’t get to take them. They went into the “shower.’’ Shmuel hurried to tell Bruno’s dad but it was too late. Bruno died. Quickly Bruno’s dad told them to never do gas ‘’showers.’’ From them one life was not the same for the boy in the striped pajamas.