I Must Betray You by Ruta Sepetys review

Title:  I Must Betray You

Author:  Ruta Sepetys

Ch: 81 plus Epilogue

Pg: 317

Genre:  YA Historical Fiction

Rating: 5 stars

Publisher: Penguin

 

It’s hard to believe that a book that takes place in 1989 is historical fiction seeing as it was only 33 years ago. And I was alive when said events took place, granted I was only two. But that’s what I must Betray you by Ruta Sepetys is. Set in communist Romania and told through the eyes of teenage Cristian Florescu.

I don’t tend to cry reading YA but I must Betray You had me in tears, but it also had me laughing and celebrating with the characters. Ruta Sepetys is the queen of YA historical fiction, she writes the history from the point of view of teens living through it. But it’s doesn’t feel like your reading YA. It’s written in a way that anyone from teens and up can get something from the story learn something.

While I learned about the Cold War and Communism in Europe, though my history teachers in high school skimmed over it my mom filled in the gaps as did my history professors in college I didn’t learn about how the conditions were in Romania. I mean I knew that they had a dictator and unlike most of my western peers I knew that Dracula was a work of fiction but that Transylvania is indeed a region of Romania.

As a reader you cannot read I Must Betray You and not be affected. You won’t be the same reader you where before I know I’m not. I didn’t not what to make of the quote “some believe that Dracula is the most frightening character associated with Romania. When they learn the truth, will it haunt them?” In the Beneath the Gilded Frame section when I started the book but did I understand by time I closed the book.