This was the Hudson Literary Guild book selection for November, and members enjoyed both the discussion and the movie, Ashes in the Snow, based on the book.
I noticed that the book is considered to be YA – young adult – designed for readers roughly 12 to 18 years of age. It’s historical fiction based in part on memories from the author’s family. Sepetys’ grandfather had been a Lithuanian military officer, but like Lina’s cousin Joanna in the story, his had family escaped to a refugee camp in Germany. However, like Lina, the narrator of the story, several members of his family were deported and imprisoned as the Soviets ravaged their country.
Stalin’s efforts to absorb the Baltic states into the Soviet Union are something about which I knew very little. As part of that effort, the Soviets began mass deportations of perceived “enemies of the people” from the region. As a university provost and having helped Joanna’s family escape to Germany, Lina’s father – and his family – would have definitely been targeted for removal.
The story was excellent and moved me to do a little Google research to learn a bit more about the Soviet occupation of the Baltic states. Its narrator is Lina, a 15-year-old girl. The story starts with the arrest of the family, including Lina, her brother Jonas and her mom Elena, and follows the family as they are taken by train to a work camp in Siberia. The family lives at that camp for nearly a year before being taken to an even more remote camp above the Arctic circle near the North Pole.
The story discusses the brutality of camp life ranging from near starvation, disease, and nearly impossible living conditions. The story also explores a variety of human behaviors and the complexity of human emotion. Overall, I think this was an excellent book for young readers to begin to learn some history that may not be well known. But the story also enables a reader to understand how people can live with optimism even in the face of abject misery.
