YA Book Pick: Between Shades of Gray

Once a month, we choose an outstanding YA book to review. We want to spotlight books of interest to aspiring writers, as well as highlight some of our favorite books and authors!

This month's book pick is Between Shades of Gray by Ruta Sepetys. While not a new book this season, it's so good I just had to write about it.

Synopsis (from Goodreads):  Lina is just like any other fifteen-year-old Lithuanian girl in 1941. She paints, she draws, she gets crushes on boys. Until one night when Soviet officers barge into her home, tearing her family from the comfortable life they've known. Separated from her father, forced onto a crowded and dirty train car, Lina, her mother, and her young brother slowly make their way north, crossing the Arctic Circle, to a work camp in the coldest reaches of Siberia. Here they are forced, under Stalin's orders, to dig for beets and fight for their lives under the cruelest of conditions.

Lina finds solace in her art, meticulously--and at great risk--documenting events by drawing, hoping these messages will make their way to her father's prison camp to let him know they are still alive. It is a long and harrowing journey, spanning years and covering 6,500 miles, but it is through incredible strength, love, and hope that Lina ultimately survives.Between Shades of Gray is a novel that will steal your breath and capture your heart.

Highlights:  When historical fiction is done well, I love it, but it's not my first choice when out hunting YA fiction. That said, I read this book over a year ago and loved it so much that I gave it out to all my colleagues at work last year  for Christmas. They may have initially been disappointed/surprised/confused when they heard the title (so close to another Shades of Gray, of course), but soon they were sold as well.

The most obvious highlight for me was that the historical story Sepetys tells here is one that is significant, but largely unwritten. We have many touching accounts of the horrors of the holocaust, but the Lithuanian purging of intellectuals hasn't had as much publicity, but is absolutely fascinating and heartbreakingly sad as well. 

I also love Sepetys depth of thematic inquiry. When I heard her speak at SCBWI after the book came out, she talked about her research, and about spending time in a gulag recreation to prepare. She said that it had scared her how close to the surface we all are to becoming savage.  Those questions about our humanity swirl around the characters, and keep bubbling up in even the setting descriptions they are so thoroughly engrained in the book as it keeps sweetly probing into what makes us human.

Notes for writers:  Sepetys does a great job of understating the atrocities she presents. While many writers might have succumbed to the temptation to be dramatic and maudlin about the horrific conditions and experiences, Sepetys fleshes out the ordinary bits of life that occur in the midst of tragedy so well that the reader is forced to see the people as more human and the situation more complex. She also includes very ordinary thoughts on love and being a teenager in the midst of darker and harder questions, a balance that's difficult to get right, and that she nails.

A good read for: Fans of historical fiction (of course), but also anyone who enjoys deep thematic issues and subtle poetic writing.

Happy reading!

Getting Our Research On

We've all been there.  Sitting, typing away, happy that our last few pages have so far gone smashingly. Then it hits us. Our protagonist must do something, be somewhere, act somehow that is totally outside of our knowledge base.  It can be as small as visiting a building we've never been to or as large as our main character's profession.  Of course there's our imagination, but there also needs to be some understanding of the environment and experience for us to speak truthfully about the events and actions that are about to take place. For our readers to take the journey with us, they must feel that as far fetched as the ideas may be, it could happen. 

Cue the process called "research".  I can't begin to imagine what writers did before the Internet though I'm sure they spent less time falling down the research hole (don't tell me you haven't spent hours clicking on wikipedia link after wikipedia link).  But the internet can only go so far.  Sometimes, you need to experience that which you are researching for yourself. 

I remember listening to Ruta Sepetys speak at the 2012 SCBWII LA Conference about the research she did to write her NYT Bestselling debut novel "Between Shades of Gray".  The novel was partly based upon the stories she heard from survivors of the Genocide of Baltic people during a visit with her relatives in Lithuania.  Hers was one of the most inspirational speeches of the conference and you could tell that she was sincere and honest in everything she said. On her website, she outlines some of her research process:

"I took two research trips to Lithuania while writing the novel.  I interviewed family members, survivors of the deportations, survivors of the gulags, psychologists, historians and government officials.  The experience was life-altering.  I spent time in one of the rain cars that was used for the deportations.  I also agreed to take part in an extreme simulation experiment and was locked in a former Soviet prison."

In her speech, Ruta went on to describe in detail the simulation experiment.  It's safe to say they gave her the real deal experience - no holds bar. 

While not everyone needs to be imprisoned in the former Soviet Union as part of their research, it is nevertheless valuable, enlightening and may just be the kick start you need for your novel.  

My protagonist is a rising star Special Agent.  I watched numbers videos, read articles and books.  But nothing was as helpful as going to the local DEA office and speaking with experienced agents.  I was amazed at how friendly and helpful everyone was.  I wanted to make sure my manuscript stayed true to the department's operations but what surprised me the most was my interviewee's understanding of the hypothetical.  This is after all, fiction. 

I came out of that experience knowing more than I could ever have from reading books or searching the web.  I was also able to test my ideas and get real time feedback as to whether certain situations could be possible and what other issues to consider.  I had a spring in my step when I left those interviews knowing that I was on the right track. 

So enjoy the research process.  Ask people questions.  The worst they can say is no, but the best thing they can do is provide you with information you would never have access to otherwise. 

HAPPY THANKSGIVING EVERYONE!