Salt to the Sea by Ruta Sepetys (2016-02-02)

Salt to the Sea tells of four passengers on the ill-fated Wilhelm Gusloff, a luxury cruise liner turned into supply and medical ship, last voyage on the Baltic Sea in 1945. The Wilhelm Gustloff is a tragedy greater than the Titanic. About 9K+ died. To tell this story, Ruta Sepetys chose a really unique storytelling mechanism. Each chapter is short and builds off of one another because each chapter belongs to a voice of each character. What I found really intriguing was that one character would describe something or have a conversation with another character, but a look or a conversation would build off the next character in the next chapter. It took some getting used to, but after a while, this technique really helped to drive the story forward.Winter of 1945. Prussia. Refugees and German civilians are fleeing because the Red Army is making a strong advance against Germany. It is clear that Germany has lost the war at this point, but is still hanging on. We all know why. Passage to safety is via the Baltic to West Germany. Everyone knows this and this is how 3 of our 4 characters meet, on this trek to safety. Each character holds a dark secret as they make their way to safe passage. The atrocities and mysteries of WWII follow each of these characters in one way or another.Sepetys really took the time set up each character background and their motivations, but toward the end the book, she appears to run out of steam. Another issue is that one character really could have used more development and background. The first half of the book, up to the embarkment on the Wilhelm Gustloff is actually the best part of the story. However, the secrets of each character are revealed mostly while on the ship, and since we already know what is going to happen and how soon, there is not enough time for that development and it feels rushed. We know from watching Titanic that major plot developments can occur during the sinking of a ship, but that does not really happen here. Resolution, if any, feels incomplete. While the final few pages (an epilogue?) were just mind boggling and made absolutely no sense.I would recommend this book. I studied WWII a lot in undergrad, and I find myself drawn to stories about or with women during WWII (no matter the country). So, if WWII is your thing, then despite its flaws, I found myself not wanting to put it down. The short chapters are perfect for working moms on the go, like myself, if you just so happen to find yourself with a pot of tea, five minutes, and in need of good book.

Hitler's voice was being broadcast on shipboard radios on the anniversary of his appointment as chancellor of Germany, on a ship named after a prominent Nazi, Wilhelm Gustloff, a ship with the capacity of 1,463 but stuffed instead with 10,573 sailors, soldiers and predominately with women and children. But no one on board was listening to Hitler when the ship was struck by three missiles from a submarine and went down in only fifty minutes, with only 12 lifeboats on board. In the bitter cold of the Baltic Sea in January. Many of those fleeing the Russian Army had crossed ice while being fired upon by Russian planes in their effort to get to the ship in the first place, and most saw it as their last hope of escaping those Russians who would be determined to make the Germans pay for the atrocities of the past few years. In 1945 25,000 people lost their lives in the Baltic Sea, over 9,000 of them in this one ship catastrophe alone. Yet, we never hear about this shipwreck that was so much larger than the Titanic. This novel was a small glimpse into the stories of the many women and children. It was told in very short chapters, some only a sentence or paragraph, most only a page or two. It was told in four voices and that helped keep the pace fast, but the emotional involvement a bit removed. I came to care what was happening, but never really to feel involved in it. It did raise my curiosity and send me to google more about the ship, the region and the entire operation Hannibal which I had never heard of before. It was compelling to read and deeply researched and interesting in many ways.

I’ve studied World War II for years. I’ve read countless books, both nonfiction and fiction, and watched a lot of documentaries. My undergrad degree is even in history. But somehow, before SALT TO THE SEA, I’d only heard about the Wilhelm Gustloff once.One mention of such an immense tragedy.I’m thankful to Ruta Sepetys for writing SALT TO THE SEA. I always enjoy historical fiction that introduces me to something I didn’t know before, which she certainly does. But more than that, the author has such a deft, confident hand that I could sense the amount of research she did and the respect she has for the survivors and victims of the Wilhelm Gustloff. Sepetys doesn’t overwhelm you with her knowledge, but inserts it subtly, weaving it into the backstories, thoughts, and actions of the characters.SALT TO THE SEA is told through the eyes of four characters. Joana is Lithuanian, a nurse who always wants to help people in need, even if helping them might place herself in danger. Florian is Prussian, a boy with a pack of secrets. Emilia is Polish, a girl on the run from unspeakable horrors. Alfred is German, a member of the Kriegsmarine, and loyal to Hitler’s every thought. By using characters of different nationalities and loyalties, the author is able to show the many sides of Operation Hannibal, when Germany evacuated soldiers and citizens ahead of the Red Army.The “chapters” in the book are short, often 2-3 pages before hopping to another character. For the first few chapters, this bugged me a bit, as I couldn’t get to know anyone with such short chapters. Then I got used to it and liked the short chapters, because the sparseness was more impactful than overloading me with details would have been.SALT TO THE SEA is one of those rare books that I’ll be thinking about for a while.

As a teacher and a parent, I have ample opportunity to observe quite how ruthlessly children can tell it how it is (even my one-year-old son has learnt to roll his eyes at me). However, in my relatively sheltered life, such a tendency is generally played out for comic effect and I have never really pondered how it might take a darker turn in more turbulent times. That is, until I read Ruta Sepetys’ Carnegie Medal winner, Salt to the Sea.In a near-lyrical style, Sepetys tells the tragic tale of four children fleeing Stalin’s Red Army through Nazi territory, hoping to find salvation on-board an evacuation ship. The story is told from the viewpoints of the four main characters: Joanna, Emilia, Florian and Alfred, each haunted by some concoction of fear, fate, shame and guilt from their past. The characters feel painfully real, brought to life with a string of drip-fed details and subtle interactions. It is how these young souls try to come to terms with and explain the atrocities of an adult world that lend the words their power.The personalities are as complex as the dark subject matter demands – for example, Alfred, a devout Nazi is easy to mock and hate. It was not until after finishing the book that I remembered his young age and realised that he is simply a lonely and troubled boy swept up by the wave of hatred that devoured much of Europe at the time. While this might not lead to forgiveness, it must surely lend itself to understanding. Aside from this main cast, the supporting characters are just as involving, with the love that develops between Heinz ‘the shoe poet’ and Klaus ‘the wandering boy’ often providing a brief respite from the lingering sense of doom.The book is split into a series of very short chapters, some stretching to only one line. However, what they lack in length, they each make up for with the strength of their emotional gut-shots, conspiring by the end to leave you feeling pummelled and punch-drunk. The often soft and gentle prose seems almost out of place when describing such bleak scenes and emotions but somehow makes them all the more affecting.The pacing of the book is very impressive. It starts off slowly and I must admit that having read the superb Carnegie-contenders The Bone Sparrow and The Smell of Other People’s Houses, I initially wondered how it had managed to beat them to the prize. However, as the pages flicked over I realised how effective the book was at evoking the tense monotony and boredom of war, the characters are constantly looking over their shoulders but with little to actually do other than trudge onwards and occasionally avert their eyes from the world’s assorted horrors. That being said, when the final action kicks off, the intensity of it is enough to leave you dizzy (I read the final 100 pages in a single stressful sitting).Despite being a ‘children’s book’, I cannot think of another text that so matter-of-factly and brutally lays bare the desperation of war. Some of the scenes involving children at the port left me so overwhelmed with disgust I had to stop reading to compose myself (the only other book ever to make me do that is American Psycho by Brett Easton Ellis). This is an important story to tell – based on an unbelievably forgotten history of a real-life event – but it is not an easy one to hear.

Like Ruta Sepetys other novel, Between Shades of Gray, reading Salt to Sea has reminded me, once again, the importance of reading books. Whether it’s fiction or non-fiction, books can shine a light on little known but important events from history. Indeed, before reading this book, I was unaware of the many thousands of German civilian refugees from East Prussia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland and Estonia who fled, at the end of the Second World War, to escape the advancing Soviet Army. Their only escape route was the Baltic Sea and so thousands of people boarded ships on the Baltic coast in an effort to reach safety. One such ship was the Wilhelm Gustloff, which departed only to be sunk by a Soviet submarine with loss of life estimated at around 9,000, in what is considered the biggest maritime disaster ever.Although published for the young adult market, Salt to the Sea can and should be read by all. The story follows the Joana, Florian, Emilia, Alfred Frick, the shoemaker poet and the wandering boy who are trying desperately to escape the advancing Soviet Army. Although it was tough to read at times, Salt to the Sea was thoroughly engaging and I turned the pages at a rapid pace. The ending felt a little compressed and as suggested by others, could have benefited from a closing epilogue but nevertheless, this was overall an excellent read.

Salt to the Sea is a powerful YA historical fiction novel set in Germany and East Prussia towards the end of World War 2. Desperate to flee, people are trekking across Germany to board the Wilhelm Gustloff that will take them away from this war-torn land. We follow four characters, all from different lands, all with secrets, all attempting to board the ship. Based on the true event of the largest maritime disaster in history, this compelling novel will take you away and leave you thinking about it long after you turn the final page.I love Supetys’ other novels, so I had very high expectations for this one, and it did not disappoint. The characters in this book are all so interesting and complex, that even though there are four different perspectives that change very frequently, I never felt the need to check the chapter headings. Even the secondary characters, some of whom did not have proper names, felt so unique and realistic that your heart ached for them as much as it did for the main characters.The pacing for this book was definitely faster than Supetys’ other novels and I found myself flying through this book. You feel the urgency the characters do to board this ship and escape the horrific circumstances they have been dealt. I could easily have read this book in a day had I not had other things get in the way.It is evident that Sepetys did an enormous amount of research for this book which completely paid off. The setting and atmosphere of this book was so bleak, you are instantly transported back to East Prussia in the winter of 1945. You felt the harshness of the winter, the urgency of the people to flee and to seek a better life, the hopelessness of their situation. Throughout the novel you are filled with dread as you are reminded what inspired this book and where it is headed, but that definitely did not take away from the reading experience whatsoever.My favourite thing about Supetys’ novels is that, even with these bleak and horrific circumstances the characters are in, we still see the goodness of humanity and how the human spirit carries on in even the most dire of situations. I cried for half an hour after reading this book and I know it is one that will stay with me.I had absolutely no idea about this tragedy before I read this book and was shocked it was not more well known. Even though the characters in this book are fictional, you are reminded that this was a real event in which 9,000 people, over half of which were children, lost their lives in one night. I urge you all to pick this book up and read it, so at last their story can be heard.

After reading Sepety's 'Between Shades' and 'Out of the Easy' a couple of years ago, I have literally been counting down the months to this book's release, and I can confidently say it did not disappoint. Set in the winter of 1945, Sepety's third novel shows the closing months of WWII from an unfamiliar perspective, the plight of East Prussia (an ancient German kingdom now part of northern Poland) during the Soviet advance across Europe, as the Nazi's began to lose footing in the East. The descriptions of the cold, the fear, the hunger, and the horror of that time are poignantly described by Sepetys in her usual harrowing yet gripping style.As with her two previous novels the protagonists are all teenagers, though the main difference with 'Salt to the Sea' is that it has four main characters instead of one, each from a very different background (one is German, one Lithuanian, one Prussian, and one Polish) offering divergent and illuminating perspectives of what WWII did to each of these nations. The narration-style switches between the first-person perspective of each of the four characters, which I found at first slightly disorienting, but once the story gripped me I didn't even notice.Although the book is advertised as being primarily about the disaster that befell the Wilhelm Gustloff, the majority of the book takes place within Prussia, showing the plight of the fleeing refugees; the ship is the setting for the book's powerful climax. I would recommend this book to anyone and everyone. It's historically accurate, it's beautifully written and fast paced, and the characters (as ever with Sepetys) are closely drawn and consistently believable.The only reason I decided to give 'Salt to the Sea' four starts instead of five is because I felt it was lacking in something. Both 'Between Shades' and 'Out of the Easy' read as though they were stories very close to Sepety's heart; I didn't quite get that impression with this book. It felt more like a piece of history Sepety's was interested in novelising, but not necessarily one that she was intensely passionate about. Regardless, this book has been worth the wait and, as I said earlier, I would absolutely recommend it!

I am absolutely amazed by the happenings at this time, this historical novel is life changing and I can not believe any reader will not be moved by this beauty. Salt to the sea, the meaning is revealed and will not be forgotten.