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troetschel's review
challenging
dark
sad
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.75
A difficult but arresting read for a number of reasons. Liza starts out as easy to empathize with, but times are desperate and there are no simple or easy choices when you are slowly starving to death. Everything has a cost - and ensuring your own survival often comes at the expense of someone else's. Despite everything, I still felt like I could understand Liza and who she was, why she made many of the choices she did - even as they turned out to have devastating consequences. Liza becomes fixated on locating her missing friend Aka, which is a driving force that influences most of her actions. She is also something of an unreliable narrator - the author did a great job of laying out clues that allows the reader to make some reasonable assumptions that are subverted with a few unexpected twists in the last 20% of the book.
Maksim was repeatedly surprised and hurt that Liza would lie to him and didn't trust him, which I found irritating and foolish. He was living a relatively sheltered life of safety and was well fed thanks to his father and his position, and the guilt he laid on Liza for the results of choices she made was unfair. Luka's deep sense of betrayal was understandable, but Maksim wasn't ever truly challenged on his privilege. His casual access to food - and the way he used his power to get a loaf of bread out of the bakery when there was a line of hundreds of people waiting outside - was never examined. His actions (and inaction) also had real consequences, and Liza shoulders an enormous weight trying to face hers while he never answers for his own.
3.5 stars rounded up, recommended for anyone who loves difficult historical fiction, complicated stories of morality, or wartime survival.
Maksim was repeatedly surprised and hurt that Liza would lie to him and didn't trust him, which I found irritating and foolish. He was living a relatively sheltered life of safety and was well fed thanks to his father and his position, and the guilt he laid on Liza for the results of choices she made was unfair. Luka's deep sense of betrayal was understandable, but Maksim wasn't ever truly challenged on his privilege. His casual access to food - and the way he used his power to get a loaf of bread out of the bakery when there was a line of hundreds of people waiting outside - was never examined. His actions (and inaction) also had real consequences, and Liza shoulders an enormous weight trying to face hers while he never answers for his own.
3.5 stars rounded up, recommended for anyone who loves difficult historical fiction, complicated stories of morality, or wartime survival.
grayday5's review
dark
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.0
lilibetbombshell's review
5.0
I struggle with labeling this book as a young adult book. Not because I don’t think it’s age-appropriate, but because I think it’s doing the book a disservice: this book should be promoted to be read by all ages. There have been a great deal of novels over time that could technically be labeled as being “young adult” (“The Call of the Wild” comes to mind), but since they were written prior to the time when the publishing industry started marketing books toward certain demographics to maximize profit they simply were read by anyone who found them interesting and then some of them became classics. Now some of those same books and some that I would argue aren’t even relevant to young adults or even important for them to read during their formative years are still considered required reading, while books labeled as “young adult” still struggle to be included in middle school and high school curriculums, even if they might be more relevant to today’s teens and young adults. Not to mention there are a great many adults who turn their noses up at any books labeled as “young adult” simply for the label, when they might be passing up a great opportunity to read an important and beautifully written book.
Such is the case with “The Hunger Between Us”. The cover, on first blush, almost makes the book look like it’s a sapphic romance. What it is, though, is a tragic, moving, violent, desperate tale of a starving girl named Liza during the Siege of Leningrad during WWII (this event was not classified as a war crime at the time, but many historians consider it to be close to an attempted genocide). During the two-plus years this event lasted, Leningrad’s citizens were trapped in the city with no way to get food or medical help, causing millions to starve or die of various illnesses or infections. Many were brutalized by their own country’s soldiers, not to mention Russia’s secret police (the precursors to the KGB), who were hiding in plain sight everywhere and ready to report on anyone showing the slightest bit of disloyalty.
I have a… fondness for Russian history. On my father’s side there’s a good deal of Russian in our blood, and out of me and my two siblings, I look the most Russian. (My siblings look like great big Anglo Saxon Germans.) That’s what piqued my interest in this book, and I wasn’t disappointed. The research that went into his book shows in the intricate, depressing, atmospheric, and painful details. You could feel the illness and the starvation on a visceral level. You can vividly imagine the feelings of longing for just one person you could trust–just one person you could hold onto as your world crumbles around you. You can feel the momentary yearning Liza has every once and awhile to just close her eyes and give up. What keeps her going is the search for her best and closest friend, who went out for food one day and didn’t come back. Liza is determined to find her, no matter what she has to do to find the answer.
It’s a compelling read, but not an easy one. As a reader, I needed to find out the answer as much as Liza did, even though I had an inkling what the answer was from the start. I just didn’t want to believe it, because I wanted Liza to have just a smidge of something happy in her life. Just that one thing she yearned for, the one thing from her life before the war she could hold onto. Liza is so sick and so depressed, but she’s brave and determined in the face of so much hate, evil, violence, and death. I’m rarely so invested in seeing a character succeed like this. But if anyone deserves a happy ending in a book, it’s Liza.
Thanks to NetGalley and FSG for granting me access to this book in exchange for a fair and honest review.
File Under: Coming of Age/Historical Fiction/YA Drama/YA Historical Fiction/YA Fiction
Such is the case with “The Hunger Between Us”. The cover, on first blush, almost makes the book look like it’s a sapphic romance. What it is, though, is a tragic, moving, violent, desperate tale of a starving girl named Liza during the Siege of Leningrad during WWII (this event was not classified as a war crime at the time, but many historians consider it to be close to an attempted genocide). During the two-plus years this event lasted, Leningrad’s citizens were trapped in the city with no way to get food or medical help, causing millions to starve or die of various illnesses or infections. Many were brutalized by their own country’s soldiers, not to mention Russia’s secret police (the precursors to the KGB), who were hiding in plain sight everywhere and ready to report on anyone showing the slightest bit of disloyalty.
I have a… fondness for Russian history. On my father’s side there’s a good deal of Russian in our blood, and out of me and my two siblings, I look the most Russian. (My siblings look like great big Anglo Saxon Germans.) That’s what piqued my interest in this book, and I wasn’t disappointed. The research that went into his book shows in the intricate, depressing, atmospheric, and painful details. You could feel the illness and the starvation on a visceral level. You can vividly imagine the feelings of longing for just one person you could trust–just one person you could hold onto as your world crumbles around you. You can feel the momentary yearning Liza has every once and awhile to just close her eyes and give up. What keeps her going is the search for her best and closest friend, who went out for food one day and didn’t come back. Liza is determined to find her, no matter what she has to do to find the answer.
It’s a compelling read, but not an easy one. As a reader, I needed to find out the answer as much as Liza did, even though I had an inkling what the answer was from the start. I just didn’t want to believe it, because I wanted Liza to have just a smidge of something happy in her life. Just that one thing she yearned for, the one thing from her life before the war she could hold onto. Liza is so sick and so depressed, but she’s brave and determined in the face of so much hate, evil, violence, and death. I’m rarely so invested in seeing a character succeed like this. But if anyone deserves a happy ending in a book, it’s Liza.
Thanks to NetGalley and FSG for granting me access to this book in exchange for a fair and honest review.
File Under: Coming of Age/Historical Fiction/YA Drama/YA Historical Fiction/YA Fiction
canderson's review
dark
emotional
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
martz's review against another edition
dark
reflective
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
2.0
littlemissbookworm's review against another edition
dark
emotional
mysterious
sad
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
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