Between Shades of Gray by Ruta Sepetys - Review
- Paige
- Jul 22, 2018
- 1 min read
HISTORICAL FICTION
Page #: 344
four point five/five
Lina Vilkas, a 15-year-old artist thrown into the rapacious grips of World War II. Torn from her formerly comfortable life, she’s sent to a Lithuanian labor camp where she digs holes that could possibly be her own. Her father is missing, off in some Siberian prison, and Lina clings to the hope that he’ll receive her drawings, uncoded messages with secrets from the treacherous camps. There, you have no comfort except from the people you give comfort to.
Sepetys skillfully interweaves the harsh reality that 130,000 Lithuanians faced within the labor camps with specks of family, charity, and hope among the Baltic peoples. It’ll keep you glued to your seat whether for an hour or four. Beautifully written, it’s a historical-fiction novel that everyone should get a chance to wallow in and see the side of the war not typically known.