Review Detail

I have not read that many World War Two books yet, the ones I have are mainly about the Jewish and what Hitler did to them, but I haven't really read that much about Russia and the countries surrounding it. All I really know about Russia in WWII was that the Germans had a battle somewhere, where they got their butts frozen off. Between Shades of Gray is about what happened to the people on the opposing side to the Germans, and how it was equally bad in some ways.

Between Shades of Gray is about Lina, your average Lithuanian. She goes to school, giggles with her cousin about boys, and draws. One night, in the year 1941, she was taken by the Soviets, pressed with the charge of being a thief. Herself and her family, her mother and her brother, and then thrown onto a cramped train with many other people, Andrius included, and then is forced to work in a labour camp. Between Shades of Gray is about her life in the few that follow her imprisonment, and what the measures she took to survive.

This was a heartbreaking book, all the way throughout. I thought that Hitler was the evil one, and he was the person to blame for most of the deaths, but then you read a book like this, and you realize, that the Soviets were awful as well, Stalin. Lina is one of the many people stuck in between the clashing greedy leaders, and is the one who has to pay for it.

I think what broke me in this book was three things. When Lina described her arm to be as thin as her mother's finger and thumb touching, that the Americans knew that the Soviets had these camps and the ending letter. It was so awful to know that some of these people were in these camps for over ten years, it was truly horrifying.

I think that Between Shades of Gray is a great book, because not many books are about what happened to some of the countries surrounding Russia. This was the first of the young adult books that dealt with this problem, and it was solved in an amazing manner.