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A review by referencegrrrl
Left to Tell: Discovering God Amidst the Rwandan Holocaust by Immaculée Ilibagiza
3.0
This is the story of how Immaculee and 7 other women were hidden in a Hutu pastor's closet-sized bathroom for 91 days as blood-hungry machete-wielding killers searched for them.
Over the course of three months, almost every member of her entire family, along with 1 million other Tutsi people, were brutally murdered by one-time Hutu friends and neighbors. The new Hutu government passed out rifles, machetes, and grenades, as well as as drugs and alchohol to feed their bloodlust. "They are cockroaches and snakes and must be killed! A baby snake is still a snake and must also be killed!" These are the reports Immaculee heard over the radio while trapped in the pastor's bathroom. A devout Catholic with no where else to turn, Immaculee began to pray. She prayed endlessly, and connected with God in such a way that she believed no harm would come to her. Her visions told her to make the pastor move a piece of furniture in front of the bathroom door to hide the doorway. Her visions told her to learn the English language while she huddled in the bathroom starving to death and enduring illness and disease. As they eventually attempted an escape to a French refugee camp, her visions empowered her to stare down the men who were hunting her and miraculously allowed her to pass.
Throughout most of the book, she is driven to survive because of her faith in God - she believes He has a purpose for her and He will see to her survival to fulfill that purpose. But near the end, she begins referring to the events unfolding around her as the result of positive thinking. As our book club discussed, was it God clearing the path for her, or was it the power of positive thinking that made her more receptive to what was right in front of her?
Overall, a heartfelt, graphic story about how one woman survived one of the most tragic, yet least talked-about events in our world's history.
Over the course of three months, almost every member of her entire family, along with 1 million other Tutsi people, were brutally murdered by one-time Hutu friends and neighbors. The new Hutu government passed out rifles, machetes, and grenades, as well as as drugs and alchohol to feed their bloodlust. "They are cockroaches and snakes and must be killed! A baby snake is still a snake and must also be killed!" These are the reports Immaculee heard over the radio while trapped in the pastor's bathroom. A devout Catholic with no where else to turn, Immaculee began to pray. She prayed endlessly, and connected with God in such a way that she believed no harm would come to her. Her visions told her to make the pastor move a piece of furniture in front of the bathroom door to hide the doorway. Her visions told her to learn the English language while she huddled in the bathroom starving to death and enduring illness and disease. As they eventually attempted an escape to a French refugee camp, her visions empowered her to stare down the men who were hunting her and miraculously allowed her to pass.
Throughout most of the book, she is driven to survive because of her faith in God - she believes He has a purpose for her and He will see to her survival to fulfill that purpose. But near the end, she begins referring to the events unfolding around her as the result of positive thinking. As our book club discussed, was it God clearing the path for her, or was it the power of positive thinking that made her more receptive to what was right in front of her?
Overall, a heartfelt, graphic story about how one woman survived one of the most tragic, yet least talked-about events in our world's history.