Between Shades of Gray

Between Shades of Gray
Ruta Sepetys
Scholastic, 2012 341 pages
Grades 7-Up
Historical Fiction

Fifteen year-old Lina lives in 1941 Lithuania. Her father works for the local university and she and her family enjoy a comfortable life. One night a knock at the door shatters it all to bits. The Soviets demand that Lina, her mother, and her younger brother pack whatever they can carry and submit to arrest. Father is not home. Was he arrested as well? The little family gets loaded into train cattle cars with other political enemies of the Soviet Union and are taken clear across Russia to Siberia, where they are dumped at a labor camp. The operators of the camp want the Lithuanian prisoners to sign away the next twenty-five years and formally submit to arrest and admit law-breaking. Lina, her family, and some others refuse to sign, which leads to a change in locale--and not for the better. Even though the Lithuanians experience terrible atrocities at the hands of the Soviets, most, somehow, manage to survive and even make some personal connections. Lina meets a boy on the train, who becomes entangled in the small family's world. Could this be a romantic interest, even in the midst of starvation and fear?

 This is the best book that I thought I read. When it was released there was so much buzz surrounding it that I thought I read it--and then recently realized that I never actually did. This has been remedied as I finally got around to it this summer. It was worth the wait in that Sepetys' debut novel is hauntingly beautiful and covers an area of world history rarely covered in teen fiction. Set in the early days of WWII, readers experience the perilous place held by Lithuania, as a prize coveted by both the Soviets and the Nazis, resulting in the loss of freedom either way. After her arrest Lina experiences and witnesses terrible things, losing her sense of entitlement and confidence, yet learning empathy and humility. Good people sometimes do bad things in this novel to survive and bad people also can sometimes do good things, demonstrating that life is not always black and white, hence the book's title. After having been confused with the naughty adult book published with a similar title a year later, when the movie came out in 2018 this title was changed to Ashes in the Snow, with a newly titled book to accompany it. Sepetys includes an author's note at the end, offering historical information and tracing her writing process. A true gem of a book about a little known time and place in history.