Between Shades of Gray

Sepetys calls love “the most powerful army” (336), and her novel is a testament to this idea. Explore Elena Vilkas’s role as a force for love and what it teaches us about compassion during times of great suffering.

Examine the role of Lina’s art in this story, including in your analysis an examination of how Edvard Munch’s work contributes to our understanding of Lina’s art and what the novel suggests about the role of art in troubled times.

Though it does not happen within the present time of the novel (we only learn about it in the epilogue), Lina and Andrius eventually get married, after twelve years in Siberia and eleven years spent apart. Trace the development of their relationship in the novel, accounting for how it became strong enough, in ten months, to withstand such a long and traumatic separation.

Analyze Lina’s flashbacks. What do they tell us about her character, particularly in relation to her father, Kostas Vilkas? How do these flashbacks help us make sense of how she responds to and makes sense of her experiences in Siberia?

Analyze the role of Nikolai Kretzsky in the novel, from his first introduction as the “young blond guard” to his final interaction with Lina the night before he disappears.

Explore the friendship between Lina and her cousin Joana. How is Lina able to reconcile her grief over what she has lost as a result of her family’s deportation with her love for Joana, whose freedom came at the cost of Lina’s own?

Comparatively analyze the characters of the bald man and the man who wound his watch, including an examination of how each man is introduced and how each one ends up at the end of the novel. What is each character’s overall purpose in the novel?

Analyze the role of one of the minor characters, such as Ona or Commander Komorov in Parts One and Two or Janina or “the repeater” in Part Three (keeping in mind that Janina also appears in Parts One and Two as the little girl with her dolly). How does the character deepen our understanding of the purpose or themes of the novel?