Between Shades of Gray: Book Review

I just finished Ruta Sepetys' fictional novel Between Shades of Gray, and I recommend it to all of you. As the above link tells you, the novel is about Lina, and her family / friends who are deported from Lithuania and sent to Siberia in 1941.

This was different than the other Holocaust materials I have read, to date, as it didn't focus on Nazi Germany and the Holocaust / Death camps, but rather labour camps in Soviet Russia, at the time of Stalin.

With many parallels between what was happening in Nazi Germany and Stalin's Russia, it was hard to believe that Sepetys' novel was indeed fiction, opposed to a memoir, similar to those I have been reading since being accepted on this trip, and returning home.

A very well written piece; realistic, emotional, heartbreaking and educational, I leave with you an excerpt from the author's note:

"Some wars are about bombing. For the people of the Baltics, this war was about believing. In 1991, after fifty years of brutal occupation, the three Baltic countries regained their independence, peacefully and with dignity. They chose hope over hate and showed the world that even through the darkest night, there is light. Please research it. Tell someone. These three tiny nations have taught us that love is the most powerful army. Whether love of friend, love of country, love of God, or even love of enemy - love reveals to us the truly miraculous nature of the human spirit.'" - Ruta Sepetys