Between Shades of Gray
By Ruta Sepetys
Plot
One night the N.K.V.D barge into a house in Lithuania with a girl in it named Lina who is 15,her brother Jonas,and her mom,while the dad is at work,so Lina,Jonas,and the mom get put on this train,and they end up staying on the train for 6 weeks,but the train ride is not fun,because they get lack of food and water. On the train the family meets many characters named Andrius who befriends Lina, Ona ,Mrs.Azkyas which is Andrius mom, Mr.Stalas, and Mrs.Rimas. Along the way on the train ride many people die,but eventually they end up in Siberia where some work by picking beets and other crops and others like Jonas make juice out of the crops,while they are in Siberia their Dad is very far away from him and a few times he sent messages/updates in code about how he is doing.At the end of the book Lina and others are transported to the Artic Circle and her and Andrius trade things so they remember eachother. I won't spoil the end haha but in the epilogue Lina and Andrius end up meeting back together and get married.
Main Characters
Lina, Mom, Jonas,Andruis, Mrs.Azkyas
Characters That Were Real / Not Real
None of the characters I mentioned above were real people, but Hitler and the NKVD both were real.
True Historical Events
Some true events that happened was there was train rides and the concentration camps. Hitler was a ruler who made people live in concentration camps where they were often tortured and they normally ended up dying there.On the train rides the people were put on trains and they weren't fed or given drinks. Hitler chose all the people that got sent to the camps and he mostly chose Jewish,Polish,and people that thought different than he did. Most of the people on the train rides died before even arriving to the camps. The rest of the people likely died from starvation at the camps.
I used some facts that I already know and I also used the website holocaustforgotten.com
One Simile
"Now she drooped like someone sucked the air out of her." page 206 your comparing Mrs.Rimas as if someone sucked all the air out of her.
One Metaphor
''He grabbed her by the arm and spit something that resembled an oyster onto her face'' page 146 Lina is comparing the spit to her Moms face.
Vocabulary Words
1.presents-too show. She presents the drawings.
2.ration- too set off a portion. She rations the food
3.hesitated-pausing or stopping. He hesitated before kissing her.
4.shaded-color lightly. She shaded the drawing lightly.
5.accepted-take in.She accepted the fact they wouldn't ever leave.