Synopsis
Lina Vilkas is a 15-year-old girl and aspiring artist living in Kaunas, Lithuania with her parents and younger brother, Jonas. On the night of June 14, 1941, her home is unexpectedly entered by the NKVD, the secret police of the Soviet Union. She, her mother, and her brother are given only twenty minutes to change clothing and pack their belongings before being arrested and deported along with hundreds of other Lithuanians.
Lina and her family are placed in a dirty cattle car. Among their group of 46 are Mr. Stalas, a sarcastic senior whom she calls the bald man; Ona, a young mother who was taken from a hospital and is accompanied by her sickly newborn girl; and Andrius Arvydas, a rebellious seventeen-year-old whom Lina quickly befriends. She makes contact with her father once, who tells Lina that she can use her art as a means of discreet communication.
Two days after their arrest, the Vilkas family begins a six-week journey to an unknown destination in Siberia. They spend much of their time in the darkness and are only provided one bucket of gray animal feed and water a day. After eight days, Ona's baby dies. Despite everything, the group rejoices at news that Germany has invaded Lithuania. Throughout the trip, Lina draws designs and codes and passes them to nearby cars, hoping to reach her father. Eventually, the train stops and they are taken away to a bathhouse and forced to strip in front of NKVD officers, one of whom gropes Lina. Afterwards, as they're loaded into another truck, a commander grabs Ona, who is chanting and restless. She screams and claws at him and he promptly shoots her.
Lina and her family are forcibly settled on a kolkhoz (collective farm) and forced to work in order to earn meager rations. Lina's mother, after hesitation, becomes an English teacher for the farm's leaders in order to support her family. As Lina settles in to her new life, she strengthens her relationship with Andrius. The refugees dig and farm, and are periodically taken to the central office where the NKVD attempt to coerce them to sign a document declaring themselves to be criminals. One man from Lina's car, Aleksandras Lukas, identifies himself as a lawyer and leads the group in a quiet, dignified refusal.
Over time, Lina becomes suspicious of Andrius and his access to food and cigarettes. She accuses him and his mother of working with the NKVD. He informs her that his mother had been forced to prostitute herself to protect him. Some months later, Jonas develops scurvy due to malnutrition. Andrius brings him tomatoes, and he and Lina rebuild their relationship as Jonas recovers.
Some time in the spring, the Vilkases are moved to a different work camp above the Arctic Circle to construct barracks. The conditions are dire and they are forced to build their own shelter to survive. They are not fed nearly enough, and as winter approaches, Jonas's scurvy returns. The NKVD claims that Lina's father has died, devastating the family. After giving up her rations to Jonas, Lina's mother becomes sick. Lina begs two NKVD officers to send a doctor, but they refuse, and her mother soon dies. As Jonas's condition worsens, a Soviet doctor and inspection officer arrives at the camp. He coordinates the delivery of food for the deportees and raw fish to treat Jonas.
In the epilogue, which is set in 1995, construction workers in Kaunas dig up a jar of papers which reveal that Lina and Jonas were held in the camp for ten more years before being released shortly before 1954. Since then, Lina had married Andrius, but was still viewed as a criminal by the Soviet Union. Unable to speak openly about her experiences, she instead buried a time capsule in her old home.
