Between Shades of Gray

by Ruta Sepetys

You stand for what is right, Lina, without the expectation of gratitude or reward.

I shut the bathroom door and caught sight of my face in the mirror. I had no idea how quickly it was to change, to fade. If I had, I would have stared at my reflection, memorizing it. It was the last time I would look into a real mirror for more than a decade.

I looked down at the little pink face in the bundle. A newborn. The child had been alive only minutes but was already considered a criminal by the Soviets. I clutched the baby close and put my lips on its forehead. Jonas leaned against me. If they would do this to a baby, what would they do to us?

The station was tucked in a deserted area, surrounded by dark woods. I pictured a rug being lifted and a huge Soviet broom sweeping us under it.

Have you ever wondered what a human life is worth? That morning, my brother’s was worth a pocket watch.

We made our way through the crowd, like a small boat cutting through a storm, unsure if we’d be sucked in or stay afloat.

Sometimes kindness can be delivered in a clumsy way. But it’s far more sincere in its clumsiness than those distinguished men you read about in books. Your father was very clumsy.”

“Kostas,” she sighed. “He was so clumsy, but he was so sincere. Sometimes there is such beauty in awkwardness. There’s love and emotion trying to express itself, but at the time, it just ends up being awkward. Does that make sense?”

“Good men are often more practical than pretty,” said Mother. “Andrius just happens to be both.”

We’d been trying to touch the sky from the bottom of the ocean. I realized that if we boosted one another, maybe we’d get a little closer.

Was it harder to die, or harder to be the one who survived? I was sixteen, an orphan in Siberia, but I knew. It was the one thing I never questioned. I wanted to live. I wanted to see my brother grow up. I wanted to see Lithuania again. I wanted to see Joana. I wanted to smell the lily of the valley on the breeze beneath my window. I wanted to paint in the fields. I wanted to see Andrius with my drawings. There were only two possible outcomes in Siberia. Success meant survival. Failure meant death. I wanted life. I wanted to survive.

It couldn’t end like this. It couldn’t. What was life asking of me? How could I respond when I didn’t know the question?

evil will rule until good men or women choose to act.

This testimony was written to create an absolute record, to speak in a world where our voices have been extinguished. These writings may shock or horrify you, but that is not my intention. It is my greatest hope that the pages in this jar stir your deepest well of human compassion. I hope they prompt you to do something, to tell someone. Only then can we ensure that this kind of evil is never allowed to repeat itself.

“In the depth of winter, I finally learned that within me there lay an invincible summer.” —Albert Camus

In 1939, the Soviet Union occupied the Baltic states of Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia. Shortly thereafter, the Kremlin drafted lists of people considered anti-Soviet who would be murdered, sent to prison, or deported into slavery in Siberia. Doctors, lawyers, teachers, military servicemen, writers, business owners, musicians, artists, and even librarians were all considered anti-Soviet and were added to the growing list slated for wholesale extermination.

The horrors the deportees endured were ghastly. Meanwhile, the Soviets ravaged their countries, burning their libraries and destroying their churches. Caught between the Soviet and Nazi empires and forgotten by the world, the Baltic states simply disappeared from maps.

It is estimated that Josef Stalin killed more than twenty million people during his reign of terror. The Baltic states of Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia lost more than a third of their population during the Soviet annihilation. The deportations reached as far as Finland. To this day, many Russians deny they ever deported a single person. But most Baltic people harbor no grudge, resentment, or ill will. They are grateful to the Soviets who showed compassion. Their freedom is precious, and they are learning to live within it. For some, the liberties we have as American citizens came at the expense of people who lie in unmarked graves in Siberia. Like Joana for Lina, our freedom cost them theirs.

Some wars are about bombing. For the people of the Baltics, this war was about believing. In 1991, after fifty years of brutal occupation, the three Baltic countries regained their independence, peacefully and with dignity. They chose hope over hate and showed the world that even through the darkest night, there is light. Please research it. Tell someone. These three tiny nations have taught us that love is the most powerful army. Whether love of friend, love of country, love of God, or even love of enemy—love reveals to us the truly miraculous nature of the human spirit.

Whether love of friend, love of country, love of God, or even love of enemy—love reveals to us the truly miracu...

After the war, if people spoke of the brutality they experienced it would have been considered anti-Soviet behavior and they would have been punished. So the story of Stalin’s terror went dormant. But it’s important to note that Lithuania was also occupied by the Germans during the war. Many people don’t know that during that time of German occupation, over 200,000 Lithuanian Jews were killed. That was an enormous percentage of the Lithuanian Jewish population. Lithuania suffered terribly under both Hitler and Stalin.

I learned that those who show kindness in an atmosphere of cruelty are truly courageous.

In terms of a message, I see this as a love story. As I was writing the book I often asked myself, “Who survives this kind of thing? How in the world did anyone survive?” But all of the survivors had one thing in common, and that was love. They survived through love. Whether it was love of country, love for one another, or love of God, they chose to focus on that love, and it kept many people alive. Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia may be small countries, but they’ve taught the world large lessons about love and freedom through peaceful endurance and silence instead of violence.

We often categorize things in extremes, but things aren’t always black or white. Sometimes the truth lies somewhere in the middle, between shades of gray. I met some survivors who told me that a Soviet guard had helped them in some way or showed them a small kindness that saved their life. Such a person was a hero to me, and I wanted to include that heroic element in the novel. So I created the character of Kretzsky, a young man who can’t see things in black and white as the Soviet system demands of him. He has reverence for human life and is deeply conflicted. Through Kretzsky, the deportees see a bit of human kindness peeking out between the many shades of gray.