Review by Choice Review
About 800,000 Tutsi were murdered by Hutu in a frenzy of orchestrated killings that began with widespread massacres in April 1994 and continued for two months until an army of Tutsi from Uganda gained the upper hand. Gourevitch is an acute journalistic observer. His interviews with survivors convey the enormous brutality of the genocide in a way impossible in an academic account. He visited the churches where Tutsi took refuge and were slaughtered. He visited the mass graves. He found the older persons or children who somehow escaped. But his is much more than a recitation of horror. By piling detail on detail and personal account on personal account, Gourevitch conveys the extent to which Hutu extremists induced villagers to destroy their compatriots, all of whom spoke the same language, shared the same religions, and had common physical characteristics. But they were identifiable as Tutsi, or they were Hutu who refused to kill. And so they were destroyed. The messages of this moving account are several: that the UN and the West could have intervened to prevent the massacres from becoming a genocide; that fear of "the other" is capable of turning apathetic villagers into butchers; that genocides are directed and serve powerful political ends. General readers; undergraduates. R. I. Rotberg; Harvard University
Copyright American Library Association, used with permission.
Review by New York Times Review
SOUTHERN LADY CODE: ESSAYS, by Helen Ellis, read by the author. (Random House Audio.) Bringing her Alabama roots to her new life as a Manhattan housewife, Ellis offers a hilarious manifesto of manners and marriage tips for the modern woman. WE WISH TO INFORM YOU THAT TOMORROW WE WILL BE KILLED WITH OUR FAMILIES, by Philip Gourevitch, read by the author. (Macmillan Audio.) The author completed an all-new recording of his 1998 book - compiling the testimonies of survivors of the Rwandan genocide - for the 25 th anniversary of the atrocities this year. HEADS WILL ROLL, by Kate McKinnon and Emily Lynne, read by a full cast. (Audible.) This audio original comedy production, written by the "Saturday Night Live" star and her sister, features readings by luminaries like Meryl Streep, Tim Gunn and the "Queer Eye" Fab Five. "ORDINARY PEOPLE CHANGE THE WORLD," by Brad Meitzer, read by a full cast. (Listening Library.) For listeners ages 5 to 8, this audio collection of a popular picture-book biography series celebrates figures including Gandhi, Rosa Parks, Lucille Ball and Jackie Robinson. THE WILD HEART OF STEVIE NICKS, by Rob Sheffield, read by the author. (Audible.) The Rolling Stone journalist takes listeners on a wild ride through the life of the iconic rock star, based on firsthand interviews.
Copyright (c) The New York Times Company [May 12, 2019]
Review by Booklist Review
The West's conventional wisdom blames ancient hatreds--"ethnic" in the former Yugoslavia, "tribal" in central Africa--for a kind and degree of savagery few can comprehend. It is an easy explanation, justifying inaction. But was it really so mindless and simple, New Yorker staff writer Gourevitch wondered? In 1994, Rwanda's Hutus, egged on by government, media, and the ruling class, killed 800,000 in 100 days, mostly members of the Tutsi minority but also Hutus who helped Tutsis rather than murdering them. After the massacre, Gourevitch spent months in a Rwanda struggling to recover from the horror; in Zaire, where some refugee camps trained Hutus for continued genocide; and in other African states whose leaders were convinced, by the international community's fecklessness in Rwanda, to help overthrow Zairean dictator Mobutu Sese Seko. With a new rebellion brewing in Zaire, Gourevitch offers vital historical context. In a world where too many groups seek their enemies' extermination, his conversations with central Africans shed light on the worst and best of which humans are capable. --Mary Carroll
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
What courage must it have required to research and write this book? And who will read such a ghastly chronicle? Gourevitch, who reported from Rwanda for the New Yorker, faces these questions up front: "The best reason I have come up with for looking more closely into Rwanda's stories is that ignoring them makes me even more uncomfortable about existence and my place in it." The stories are unrelentingly horrifying and filled with "the idiocy, the waste, the sheer wrongness" of one group of Rwandans (Hutus) methodically exterminating another (Tutsis). With 800,000 people killed in 100 days, Gourevitch found many numbed Rwandans who had lost whole families to the machete. He discovered a few admirable characters, including hotelier Paul Rusesabagina, who, "armed with nothing but a liquor cabinet, a phone line, an internationally famous address, and his spirit of resistance," managed to save refugees in his Hôtel des Milles Collines in Kigali. General Paul Kagame, one of Gourevitch's main sources in the new government, offers another bleak and consistent voice of truth. But failure is everywhere. Gourevitch excoriates the French for supporting the Hutus for essentially racist reasons; the international relief agencies, which he characterizes as largely devoid of moral courage; and the surrounding countries that preyed on the millions of refugeesmany fleeing the consequences of their part in the killings. As the Rwandans try to rebuild their lives while awaiting the slow-moving justice system, the careful yet passionate advocacy of reporters like Gourevitch serves to remind both Rwandans and others that genocide occurred in this decade while the world looked on. (Oct.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Library Journal Review
In 1994, the world was informed of the inexplicable mass killings in Rwanda, in which over 800,000 were killed in 100 days. Gourevitch, a staff writer for The New Yorker, spent over three years putting together an oral history of the mass killing that occurred in this small country. He interviewed the survivors, who told him their horror stories of violence. Most of the killings were done with a machete. Friends killed friends, teachers killed students, and professional workers killed co-workers. The United Nations was slow in reacting to this crisis and refused to classify the incident as genocide. The title of this book comes from a Tutsi pastor's letter to his church president, a Hutu. While this is a powerful book, it sometimes bogs down in the details of Rwandan politics. It is doubtful the average reader will want to pick it up, but the history of this genocide must be told. This book should find itself on the shelves of academic libraries where African history collections are strong. [Previewed in Prepub Alert, LJ 5/15/98.]Michael Sawyer, Northwestern Regional Lib., Elkin, NC (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
A probing chronicle of the mass ethnic slaughter in Rwanda that raises questions about human survival and coexistence in that country and everywhere. In a period of 100 days during 1994, at least 800,000 Rwandans died in government-sanctioned mass killings. The government, dominated by Rwanda's Hutu majority group, decided that it was necessary to rid the country of its Tutsi minority and called on its Hutu citizens to carry out this collective charge. Further slaughter ensued in a horrific aftermath, when victims and perpetrators found themselves together in Zairian refugee camps. Gourevitch, a regular writer for the New Yorker, responded to the Rwandan massacres both professionally and personally. As a child of Holocaust survivors, he felt himself relentlessly drawn to a country where T-shirts read ``Genocide. Bury the dead, not the truth. The result of Gourevitch's repeated trips to Rwanda during and after the massacres is a book that is less a history lesson (though it is that, too) than a series of meditative essays on the deeper meanings of the Rwandan genocide. Gourevitch deftly weaves together historical background to the massacres (arguing against the oft-invoked theory of ancient rivalries), firsthand accounts of the killings, stories of survival and loss related by a handful of Rwandans, and cynical criticism of international agencies handling of the situation. Without invoking Bosnia or multiethnic societies worldwide, Gourevitch shapes his discussion of Rwanda into a broader inquiry into human psychology and collective identity (``Genocide, after all, is an exercise in community building''). Despite the cruelty and injustice of the situation he describes, Gourevitch remains an optimist, closing with the courageous example of Hutu and Tutsi girls under attack who risked their lives by refusing to separate themselves by ethnicity. Gourevitchs first book should be required reading for those seeking a better understanding of Rwanda's massacres; its also a thoughtful investigation of ethnic conflict and its aftermath.
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