Book review
Oh GOD THIS BOOOK…god man!!! Only two of them survived god damn it this sad book!
SAD LETS TALK ABOUT IT
REVIEW SPOILERS MAY BE PRESENT:
Hiya Guys – Welcome to the Nether! Today I am going to talk about Salt to the Sea by Ruta Sepetys! This book DAMN guys this book – honestly it’s really hard to talk about this book because of all the realistic events that have been taking place within its history. As you guys probably y’all know World War 2 was one of the biggest tragedies of all time. We take remembrance of it today because we do not want to have history repeat it self – scary how anything like this had happened. This book it particular is told by four points of view from four different sections of Europe – put into one cohesive fictional story that is beautiful and tragically sad. I appreciate the authors history no in the back of the novel if you’re not very well in tuned with this side of World War 2’s history – but without further ado I’m gonna try to recite the plot of this tragic novel in my own words because God dang it it was very very sad but very hopeful by the end.
As you guys know this kind of takes place by the end of World War 2 – with the characters kind of being in I think the Prussian area. As I said above there are four points of view with four different interesting perspectives on things – two of them being girls two of being guys. I’m going to start with the girls and then get to the guys. Joana is a young nurse from Nethawania (Lithuania) who had to run away from our home country to take refuge in Germany. She is a nurse and she is kind of all means of the word. Amelia is a Polish refugees that has run away from Poland to get away from the Russian regime. She is pregnant at 15 because she was raped by a Russian soldier and you see her struggling through that throughout the entire novel. Then we have the guys of the story. We have Florian who is a German kind of artist who ran away from what he was allegedly doing because he was lied to by German officials about certain things that he was doing. He took the key to a certain room which they called the ember room – which was supposed to be Hitler’s type of special place of some sort so he’s hiding from German officials because of his stolen key. Then we have Alfred who is a German soldier who basically goes by every rule. Kind of crazy throughout the entire novel and even gets his girlfriend thrown into a concentration camp which I was really shocked that happened at the end let me tell you! I literally almost started crying and I never cry at sad novels oh my God guys this book was so hard to read at points. I literally did start to cry when Amelia died OK let’s go to the points before I start going on a rant about how Amelia shouldnt have died!
Point: you always start with the romance of any novel so we’re gonna start with Joanna and Florians romance. I thought I was very well-built even though it wasn’t the center of the entire novel which usually happens with a lot of contemporaries but since this is a a store cool fiction novel it’s supposed to show the means of war especially because this book was set on a ship that ultimately sunk with 10,000 people on it – this is not a very big focal point in the book. I really do like like I said the development of the romance and how they develop feelings towards each other by the end of the novel which they do end up marrying and having a child of their own by the end. They also adopt The two children who survived the war as well Amelia’s child and Clouse who was the wondering boy. I really wish that Amelia had a solid romance as well I was hoping that was going to be Alfred and Alfred was going to switch his Waze by the end of the entire book. It does not happen but I really did love Florian and Amelia’s friendship – which I think the young girl did need at this time in her life when she was faced with something so devastating as her pregnancy.
Point 2: The book is based off of true events that took place towards the end of World War II like I said in the plot – which this book shows the desperate and needs that humans would go to in order to survive in such a harsh condition. There is a lot of death in this novel which is not explained and gruesome detail but in detail enough for you to get images in your head on some of the things that went on in the time period that it’s set in. This book is very well written and I feel like even in the authors note the author Ms. Sepetys wanted to make it so young readers could understand what went on at this particular time especially because she has a personal connection with this event in history. I really didn’t know anything about this reticular event that went on in World War II and maybe because I did not take a holocaust class in college to know what went on in this particular time period between 1940 to 1950 when World War II was taking place – but I have taken a lot of US history and modern Europe classes to kind of understand why the setting was trying to show even though it was a work of fiction. This is a very well done work of fiction that’s based off a true events that happened kind a like the Titanic movie like the romance really did happen but the event happens if you get what I’m saying guys. anyway it’s very beautifully betrayed and such a tragic way that’s all I can say about the plot.
Point 3: there is it a lot of side characters and if they were any they died mostly by the end. I think the only side character who did not die or you don’t know what happened to where is Ava who was that big hunky woman you don’t know what happened to her by the end there is no indication if she even fell off the boat or if she was dead and somebody tell me if I’m wrong or not about that but from my furtherer understanding no one knows what happens to her. The other side characters were like Clouse in the baby there is some nurses and doctors are very a relevant to the story there is a little girl that’s want Alfredo at one point but she’s like tragically murdered by the next chapter that was like oh my God I was almost throwing up at that point OK – back to my review.
Point 4: This is a very heartbreaking novel and if you are very triggered by realistic events I would suggest not reading it. I did not like that in the audiobook version of the Novel anyway – A person who is playing Amelia which I did love the character but I did not like who was portraying in her in the audiobook – she kept saying a August wrong which I was like ‘please stop saying it wrong please!’ But other than that it’s not the story that I had a problem with it was mostly the audiobook with the people trying to make the accents up that weren’t really accents. Other than that I had nothing wrong to say about this novel it’s very hard to read at points like I keep saying I think I’ve said it maybe five times now. I liked the ending of it even though I didn’t necessarily love that Amelia died but at least she was buried within rose petals that I think she would’ve wanted. I did also like the Florian and Joanna ended up being together by the end and creating the small little family of theirs. Alfred kind of had a tragic death but you know he was kind of not in his right mind.
So in conclusion I can only give this book a five star rating is beautiful at points it’s heartbreaking it’s tragic you know there is nothing else I can say about it it’s very compelling to read to her like I do really want to put this book down our points because I wanted to see what happened to the characters because I grown attachment to them throughout the entirety of this book. If you like history and you want to learn a little bit more about World War II and maybe what happened to the ship that happened you should pick up the novel it deserves it’s Goodreads award for best YA Fiction in my opinion. I’m going to read something more lighthearted now because I don’t think I can stomach another sad book I’ll see you guys the next time I read a novel!
BYE~
((dying on the inside- need to figure out what to do with my life now))
- Goodreads rating – 4.36
- SUMMARY – Maria