Book Review - Salt to the Sea by Ruta Sepetys

 Ruta is one of those new age authors that I am coming to admire immensely. Her writing style isn’t overly dramatic but rather like a recitation of a person’s diary, factual and precise. While this may not be the ideal style that authors prefer but for Ruta, IT JUST WORKS! Part of the reason it works is because her plots mainly revolve around tragic historical events, and if written in a dramatic way may overtax the sensibilities of the reader. Her writing style helps readers to not become overly attached to the characters in the novel, as these are realistic people with flaws and not some selfless superheroes, but rather glue the readers attention to the course of action taken by them. I also like that Ruta writes about lesser know events, this really helps the reader see history with a different perspective. She is Lithuanian ethnically, and therefore has focused more on the Baltic point of view of the WW2.

Book Cover

Her previous title Between Shades of Grey told the story of Lina, a Lithuanian who survived Siberian Gulag Camps. In this story we meet Joanna who is Lina’s cousin, due to whose escape to Germany Lina’s family was punished. But I couldn’t make out the connection between these two until more than three quarters of the book was finished. This is a good thing because we see the character development of Joanna without being prejudiced against her.

The story is told through four different voices. Joanna, a Lithuanian Nurse who repatriated to East Prussia. Florian, a Prussian who deserts Germany in quest for revenge. Emilia, a Polish teen who is fighting for her survival. And Alfred, a German sailor who is a sociopath.

Operation Hannibal

Some scenes moved me more than the others. The death of Ingrid on the frozen sea, the backstory of Emilia and the chilling details of how she reimagines her rape to be some romance in her head in order to find solace. Florian also gets used by some high ranking people, and when he realises that he is just a pawn to be discarded when in troubled times decides to takes revenge by stealing the amber swan. The attachment of the boy Eli and the shoemaker also depicts how in the time of trouble the you seek your family despite blood relations. The pawning of children for getting passage on the board, shows the cruelty of human nature when it becomes acceptable to trade innocents in order to save your own neck. Alfredo was one hell of a psychopath. When in the end despite the sinking of the ship when he is on the raft with Emilia, he tries to kill her after realising she is Polish, I am deeply aghast. Initially I thought he was just a rejected person who is depressed and so is penning down mental letters to his crush who rejected him. But when I learn that Hannelore his crush is Jewish and he actually wanted her to get persecuted for that I hated him. Emilia’s death is beautiful as she is finally stops her wandering in death and reaches the happiest place for her, her own home. The presence of her mother and her daughter Halinka in her death dream shows that despite all of the difficulties she is finally at peace.

Wilhelm Gustloff  in its days of glory

The depiction of the sinking, reminds me of scenes from the Titanic.  Finally Joanna, Florian, Eli and Halinka are the only surviving members of the group on the ship. They emigrate to America and decide to put the war behind them in order to start a new life as an assorted family. Overall,  a 4.5/5 for me.

Book Review- The Tattooist of Auschwitz by Heather Morris

 

I read Cilka’s Journey before this book because it was written with a female perspective, while this book had a male protagonist. And my intuition proved to be right. I definitely enjoyed Cilka’s story more than Lale, not only because Cilka endured a lot more than Lale did, but also because being a woman I could relate to Cilka’s emotions more. But that does not take away the fact that this was a great novel as well.

Lale like most other persecuted groups in occupied Germany was led to believe that he was going to work for the Germans. The harrowing conditions of the train journey to Auschwitz were only the beginning. Soon he realized than he was in a concentration camp destined for persecution. But he did not lose hope and determined that he would survive and tell his story to the world no matter what. This determination of his did not waver even when he was on doors of death by various means. Cholera, the beating, or even in the end during the death march.  Soon he realised that in order to survive he needed to work a privileged job sans hard labour. Thus he eagerly took up job as the assistant Tattooist  when an Elderly French prisoner offered him. Soon he became the head tattooist and started getting extra rations and began sharing it with people.

Auschwitz Concentration Camp 

Another driving factor to his survival was his love for Gita. Gita wasn’t the most beautiful women, but she had this connection with Lale right from the moment he set eyes on her while tattooing her prisoner number. She worked in the offices and Lale set up occasional meeting with her. The guards who oversaw him as well as her were well bribed for these meetings by him so they didn’t really mind.

 

One incident that really pierced Lale’s heart was when all the Roma people living in his block were killed. The pain of seeing his friends and the children with whom he played everyday being killed, prevented him from making friends inside the camp ever again. He also stuck a bargain with the local Polish father-son duo to exchange valuables for things he needed.

His Romanian Guard was one broken character, who had left his family to join the Nazis and was one hell of a misogynist. I both hated and pitied him cause he was trying to be friends with Lale but his selfish nature prevented him from forming any sort of friendship with anyone. One time Lale was discovered with stolen valuables by the Nazis and beaten almost to death for it, but Cilka with her influence saved him.

The most disturbing character for me was the Doctor. He used to give poisonous toffees to children, selecting them for getting executed, and did horrible experiments on people just for fun. The time when he cut Lale’s assistants balls angered me a lot.

When the Russians were on their way to Auschwitz the male prisoners were moved elsewhere, Lale managed to escape and was then caught by the Russians. There due to his skill with languages he was recruited by them forcibly, to find local  Polish women for having sex with. His job was to go into town each morning and offer women money and jewellery for their services in the evening. Each day he was accompanied by a guard in a jeep, but one day he was sent alone. So he took chance and escaped the Russians. Then he came back home to Czechoslovakia to find that only his sister had survived the ordeal, and she was now married to a Russian man named Sokolov. He then began his search for Gita in Prague.

Gita had been sent on a death march along with other women prisoners from Birkenau. But she along with some polish women managed to escape the Germans and take shelter with local people. She then made her way back to Prague and was waiting for Lale. Their meeting in the end was truly a scene from the movies and really emotional. They got married, started a business, went bankrupt, Lale went to jail, he escaped on bail, they escaped to Australia, started another business there, had a son after trying for years. But in all these years of troubles they never cried to God for help, rather they were just happy to enjoy the life God had granted them.

Gita and Lale with their son

 Overall a 4/5 for me. This was an enjoyable read. But I am still glad I read Cilka’s story first which got me on hook to read this one.

Book Review - Cilka’s Journey by Heather Morris

I was in this phase that I was really into WW2 fiction. But I had enrolled my friend Tanvi into reading a book with me. As I wanted her to not get bored, I chose this book as it had a female protagonist as well as plot about the lesser known Soviet labour camps. This is not a long book, roughly 330 pages, but it packed 13 years wonderfully into that limited space. I knew from the foreword that this had some disturbing events, but the extent to which those events went were unimaginable.

 Cecilia Klein was a 16-year-old Czechoslovakian Jew. She and her sister along with millions of Jewish girls were sent to Auschwitz II i.e. Birkenau Concentration Camp on pretext of working. Her Parents were also transported to concentration camp. There she caught the eye of a German high-ranking Officer, Schwarzhuber and was forced to become his sex slave in order to survive. She was made the overseer of Block 25, where women being sent to the gas chambers spent their last night. These positions of relative privilege helped her survive the camp, but also mentally traumatised her. At one point she even had to send her own mother to her death and had to watch her sister Magda die of typhus. She had very few friends in camp because she was seen as a Nazi collaborator. But she was very true to her friends Gita, Lale, Dana and Ivanka.

Cilka with her father and sister

Cilka in Auschwitz 

When Auschwitz was liberated by Russians, Cilka was very happy that she would finally be able to go home. But this happiness did not last for long, as she was sentenced to fifteen years of hard labour for helping the Nazi’s. Her fault was sleeping with the Nazi’s. This reasoning was so fucked up, I mean obviously a young girl cannot prevent her captors from raping her. But as I read the book and came to know that some people were sent to the labour camps for stealing a bread or for marrying someone belonging to a different nationality, I understood that Stalin was no different from Hitler. He too like Hitler wanted the prisoners to do maximum work before they died. They were just dispensable items to him who were to be used and the thrown away. While the Nazi’s selected people to die based on their religion, Stalin chose people who were educated and could be revolutionaries in the Soviet occupied territories, who were outliers and could bring about a change in the Russian society, or those who were prisoners of war and fought against Russia.

Though the conditions in the Vorkuta Labour Camp were better than those in Auschwitz, it was still a propaganda to control people. Here too Cilka tried her best to survive and got a better position as a hospital nurse. She befriended Josie, Natalya and Olga. Elena was an enemy who later turned into an ally. But she also had a blackmailer called Hannah who threatened to expose her job in Auschwitz to the other women in their block. Cilka formed a sort of trustship with her supervisor Dr. Yelena Georgiyevna and was able to later tell her about her life in Auschwitz. The most horrifying event came at the night, when men stormed into the women blocks and raped. Boris who is Cilka’s protector develops a one-sided attraction to her and she pretends to like him in return. This side of Cilka’s character to pretend attraction to men whom she didn’t like be it Schwarzhuber or Boris bothered me a bit, but as I understood the alternative was being manhandled I forgave her for her acts.  

The conditions of the babies born in the camp as well as their separation from their mothers at the age of two was appalling. This according to me was being done so that the kids when they grew up should have no connection with their roots and also so that they should not know the horrific face of the Soviet policies. Cilka is very brave as well, which is proved during her time in the ambulance duty.

Cilka for a long time tries not to fall in love as she knows that the camp holds no future for love. But she nonetheless falls for Aleksandr, a Czech prisoner in the camp. The interactions between him and Cilka when he is recuperating at the hospital are sweet. The last scene on the train when they both reunite in the train to Prague made me very happy. It’s great that Cilka married the love of her life and lived happily for the rest of it. Overall a good and interesting book which deserves a 4.8/5.

 

                                                                Cilka with her husband