2011 book 82

Ruta Sepetys' Between Shades of Gray
God, was this heartbreaking, and not in the usual YA novel way (I'm really not sure why this is being marketed as a YA novel, except that the main character is a teenage girl). Anyway, it's 1941 and teenage Lina and her family are deported from Lithuania by the Soviets, and she's really not sure why (frankly, there is no good reason why). Separated from her father, she, her mother, and her little brother must find a way to survive in Siberia. There is a hint of romance but it doesn't feel shoehorned in, and Sepetys doesn't shy away from the horrors of history. I did think the end felt a bit abrupt, but I can see how it was a logical stopping point to the story--I just wasn't ready for the story to end. A/A-.