I should probably wait until this book is actually released before I rant and rave about how wonderful it is, but I read it back in September or early October, I think, and it doesn't come out until March and I just can't wait that long.
In history classes across the United States Hitler's Holocaust often overshadows that of Stalin's killing of between 3- and 60 million people during his rule of the USSR. Some died in Gulags, some died on their way to Gulags, some were shot without the chance to survive a Gulag, all were charged with crimes against the state-- "counterrevolutionary activities" ranging from being active members of political parties to being an accomplice by not informing the state of a known criminal.
In Between Shades of Grey, Lina -- the main character, a Lithuanian -- is fifteen when she and her family are arrested because her father is a professor. They are taken at night to trains, shipped like cattle to their next destination. The rest of the book is largely Lina grappling with the horrors permitted by the state under Stalin's rule.
Ruta Sepetys brings each of her characters to life through her descriptions. Her writing is beautifully human despite the inhumanity Lina encounters. She fleshes out other prisoners and the guards; their greed and anger, their fear and guilt, and, for some, their selflessness, they're all mixed together to form as complete and real people as I've seen on paper.
The book begins with a provocative statement: "They took me in my nightgown." This simple sentence is a jarring juxtaposition of the distress and invasion of privacy, of not being safe in the most comfortable and intimate of settings. From here, the atrocities people are capable of tug at heartstrings and yank tears out of the driest eyes (like mine).
Hope is a large part of Lina's story, as it is in most extreme situations that test the human condition. Lina holds most to a need to tell what happened to her and the others with her, but also to family and (remember, she's 15 when we meet her, it's inevitable) to first love-- which keep her going while those around her destroy themselves with despair.
This is certainly one of the best books I've read recently, and definitely one of the best teen books I've ever read. Sepetys is certainly successful in her goal of putting a few faces to the millions lost to Stalinism.
Between Shades of Gray is out March 22, 2011.
