Lina has changed into her nightgown and settled at her desk to write her cousin Joana a letter, when a pounding hits their front door. Papa isn’t home and her mother reluctantly opens the door. Soldiers yell and thrust their demands into their apartment. 20 mins is all they have to pack before being shoved into the back of a covered truck with many others. Somehow they are on a list the Russian soldiers have. But why?

Before long, Lina, her mum and little brother Jonas are facing an endless snake of livestock rail cars, along with hundreds of other Lithuanians. Six weeks crammed into these railcars with limited water and animal feed to survive on changes Lina forever. There is no privacy, no way to keep clean and people die around her. She also meets a boy her mother has tricked the soldiers into thinking he’s simple.

Andrius is anything but, and is Lina’s saviour both mentally and physically when they are living on a collective farm. They all work from dawn to dusk, digging, felling trees and much more than women, children, the elderly and infirm can handle. But Lina is determined to stay alive, find her father and go back to her old life.

Lina is an accomplished artist and has been drawing all that she sees on their terrible journey into slavery, and when possible handing them to other slaves who many be able to get the drawings to her father. She doesn’t know where he is, but focusing on her drawings, Andrius’ kindness and her mother’s strength of spirit, helps her get through her days.

The unthinkable happens and their lives become even worse as they are shipped to the Arctic circle in Siberia, the hardest challenge to survive yet.

Originally a novel and now a movie titled Ashes in the Snow, Between Shades of Gray has now been adapted into this Graphic Novel. Even the author note from multi award winning Ruta Sepetys is in Graphic Novel format.

This part of the war is not written of as much as Auschwitz, Bergen or other Holocaust atrocities of WWII, but in 1939, the Soviet Union occupied Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia. Doctors, Lawyers, Teachers, Librarians and anyone the soviets decided were enemies of the state, were transported into slave labour camps in Siberia. Many remained this way for 10-15 years!

Finally returning to their homes in the 1950’s, there was nothing to return to – everything they ever had, taken.

This is a sobering graphic novel, showing all the horrors and ruthlessness of the soviets, but also portraying the strength of the human spirit. Kindness, song, memories and drawing help Lina to survive, with even love blooming under the starvation, endless toil and hopelessness around her.

There may be life at the end of this story, but it is no happy ending.

Author – Ruta Sepetys

Graphic Novel

Illustrator – Dave Kopka

Colour – Brann Livesay

Age – 13+

Read another Ruta Sepetys novel book review (Click on the Cover)

(Penguin, 2022, Graphic Novel, War, 1941, Lithuania, Soviet Union, Russia, Soldiers, Siberia, Hope, Love, Family, Siblings, Kindness, Death, Family, Historical, Grief, Courage, Growing up, Secret, Drawing, Sketching, Slavery, Arctic Circle, World War 2, WWII, World War II)