Lily Kazemi
Reporter
Staying home this April break with nothing to do? Looking for a book to read on the plane to and from (insert tropical location here) but aren’t in the mood for all of the supernatural romance novels that fill the shelves at Barnes and Nobles? (Really, how many Twilight knock-offs are going to be made? I’ve given up on scoping books straight from the store). Get ready to fall in love with Lina, a 15-year-old Lithuanian girl separated from her parents by the Soviet army in Ruta Sepetys’ Between Shades of Gray. In a world that’s filled with poorly-written teen books focused on relationships and boy drama, Sepetys is able to paint a compelling story that is not only beautifully written, but incredibly eye-opening as she describes the havoc that the Soviet Communists wreaked.
Though the book is brand new (it was released in March of this year), Lina’s story makes you forget about the present. It’s as if a time machine has transported you back to 1941. Lithuania, a country trapped between the war-stricken countries of Nazi Germany and the Stalinist Soviet Union, was never truly able to tell its story until it gained independence in 1991. Lina’s tale is a mixture of both true events and fictional ones, but if there is one thing I took out of it, it’s that no matter what your life might be like, something truly devastating can come and rock your world. After all, she had enjoyed a fine life in her home country – her parents were intelligent and wealthy, and Lina herself was an aspiring artist.
Well, she was until the Soviets destroyed life as she knew it. Stalin’s men, who’s purpose is to deport anti-Soviet traitors to concentration camps, much like Hitler did with the Jewish, take Lina’s father away and arrest him. She, her mother, and her brother Jonas are shipped off to the coldest plains of Siberia, where, under the orders of Stalin, they are forced to fight for their lives every second of the day. Each family finds a way to hold onto hope – for some, it’s something so simple as having a bit more food to eat from the meager supplies they were able to steal. Lina herself finds peace in her artwork, the one passion she has that keeps her connected to her former life. In her paintings she attempts to encode secret messages that she hopes will reach her father, assuring him that his family is still alive and well.
Watching Lina struggle to hold onto this little reassurance that she has, depending on it as her reason to survive, was one of the most heart-wrenching things I have ever had to experience as a reader. Between Shades of Gray will definitely be a book you will not be able to put down – watching Lina come together as a person, amidst all of the death, the destruction, the pain and suffering, and remain brave, is one of the most inspiring plots I have ever read.
