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A review by celia_thebookishhufflepuff
Between Shades of Gray by Ruta Sepetys
5.0
I started this yesterday, went to school, and read it constantly from 4:00 pm. It is now 10:00 pm today.
When I was in seventh grade, I read seven or eight Holocaust novels and memoirs for a school project. I think I'd known at least a little bit about it since I was in third grade. But it was only last year, my junior year of high school, that I learned how the cold war really got started. I realized the Soviet Union was actually far more similar to Germany than the US, its "ally." Before [b:Between Shades of Gray|12913325|Between Shades of Gray|Ruta Sepetys|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1366509442s/12913325.jpg|10870318], I never understood just how similar the two situations were.
[b:Between Shades of Gray|12913325|Between Shades of Gray|Ruta Sepetys|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1366509442s/12913325.jpg|10870318] chronicles Lina, a teenager forcefully removed from Lithuania and sent with her family into Siberia. As with many of the Holocaust novels I remember reading, I was utterly shocked at what could have led Stalin's men to absolutely not see the humanity in their fellow humans. Even now, it's hard for me to completely understand that these were real events, and almost nothing is fictionalized.
Lina chronicles her story through art: she draws what she sees and what she feels. Through this, she defines her role as a sister, daughter, friend, and prisoner. I understand that people often did this in the WWII era, and I believe it's a really good thing people did. The oppressed needed their stories to be remembered, and the fact that WWII is one of the biggest things we learn in school really exemplifies that need.
Today, it is possible we are facing something similar. The border crisis, which stems from the problems that the US helped to create in Latin American countries, has led to a rise of deportations and detainment offices, which in many ways are similar to camps. I hope these people are drawing too. This was and is absolutely something needed to maintain history, and without this pure knowledge that someone in the future should and would see the creations, a lot of history would have been lost.
This is the first novel I read by [a:Ruta Sepetys|3407448|Ruta Sepetys|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1344869981p2/3407448.jpg], but I definitely plan to explore more of her work. She writes beautifully, and I can tell her stories all address relevant social or historical issues.
I might be able to write a fuller review later, but this book was so emotionally overwhelming that I don't know if I will be able to, until the next time I read it. And I will definitely be reading it again.
When I was in seventh grade, I read seven or eight Holocaust novels and memoirs for a school project. I think I'd known at least a little bit about it since I was in third grade. But it was only last year, my junior year of high school, that I learned how the cold war really got started. I realized the Soviet Union was actually far more similar to Germany than the US, its "ally." Before [b:Between Shades of Gray|12913325|Between Shades of Gray|Ruta Sepetys|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1366509442s/12913325.jpg|10870318], I never understood just how similar the two situations were.
[b:Between Shades of Gray|12913325|Between Shades of Gray|Ruta Sepetys|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1366509442s/12913325.jpg|10870318] chronicles Lina, a teenager forcefully removed from Lithuania and sent with her family into Siberia. As with many of the Holocaust novels I remember reading, I was utterly shocked at what could have led Stalin's men to absolutely not see the humanity in their fellow humans. Even now, it's hard for me to completely understand that these were real events, and almost nothing is fictionalized.
Lina chronicles her story through art: she draws what she sees and what she feels. Through this, she defines her role as a sister, daughter, friend, and prisoner. I understand that people often did this in the WWII era, and I believe it's a really good thing people did. The oppressed needed their stories to be remembered, and the fact that WWII is one of the biggest things we learn in school really exemplifies that need.
Today, it is possible we are facing something similar. The border crisis, which stems from the problems that the US helped to create in Latin American countries, has led to a rise of deportations and detainment offices, which in many ways are similar to camps. I hope these people are drawing too. This was and is absolutely something needed to maintain history, and without this pure knowledge that someone in the future should and would see the creations, a lot of history would have been lost.
This is the first novel I read by [a:Ruta Sepetys|3407448|Ruta Sepetys|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1344869981p2/3407448.jpg], but I definitely plan to explore more of her work. She writes beautifully, and I can tell her stories all address relevant social or historical issues.
I might be able to write a fuller review later, but this book was so emotionally overwhelming that I don't know if I will be able to, until the next time I read it. And I will definitely be reading it again.