Reviews tagging 'Genocide'

Our Lady of the Nile by Scholastique Mukasonga

11 reviews

finnm4's review

challenging dark informative sad tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Genocide, Racism, Sexual violence, Toxic relationship, Violence, Stalking, Murder, and Sexual harassment

Moderate: Adult/minor relationship, Bullying, Child death, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Sexual content, Police brutality, Religious bigotry, Pregnancy, Toxic friendship, Colonisation, War, and Classism

Minor: Infertility, Miscarriage, and Abortion

well_read_unicorn's review against another edition

challenging dark informative tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Genocide, Hate crime, Sexual assault, Xenophobia, and Colonisation

Moderate: Death

Minor: Rape and Antisemitism

my_a's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

J'ai adoré la plume de ce livre! Direct, efficace, et elle a contribué aux scènes très visuels. Les descriptions du lycée l'ont rendu lui-meme un personnage principal.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Genocide, Racism, Violence, and Xenophobia

Moderate: Pedophilia, Pregnancy, and Colonisation

katiewhocanread's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Xenophobia

Moderate: Adult/minor relationship, Child abuse, Child death, Genocide, and Rape

amaezinggeorge's review against another edition

challenging inspiring tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Bullying, Genocide, Racism, Sexual content, Religious bigotry, Colonisation, and War

Moderate: Rape

andrea_gagne's review against another edition

informative slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Genocide, Sexual assault, and Violence

my_plant_library's review

challenging emotional slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Genocide, Physical abuse, and Violence

Moderate: Death, Miscarriage, Rape, and Sexism

liesbethvv's review against another edition

lighthearted reflective tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.75

A group of teenage girls in an elite catholic lyceum installed by the Belgian colonial regime in Rwanda try to juggle their aim to become Rwandese elite, just being teenage girls and the complicated racial and tribal tensions some 15 years before the height of the Rwanda genocide.
I enjoyed the narrative trick of each of the girls and their teachers representing a different fraction of the historically built conflict and learning about Rwandan history without it taking the center stage. The characters could have some more depth though, I would have loved a longer book or less characters. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Genocide, Racism, Rape, and Sexual violence

Moderate: Sexism and Violence

Minor: Miscarriage, Xenophobia, Religious bigotry, and Toxic friendship

curatoriallyyours's review against another edition

challenging tense slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.5

Our Lady of the Nile is an elite Catholic boarding school for girls in Rwanda. In this story, set 15 years prior to the 1994 Rwandan genocide, the tension between Hutu and Tutsi students is palpable and reflects the general state of things in the country. What I really liked about this book was the social commentary that the author quietly inserted via the opinions of characters. She shows the conditions that led to the genocide, including Belgian involvement in Rwanda, as a slow buildup to the final events of the book. The numerous narrators and some of the odd storylines didn’t work for me. My edition of the book also had some muddled up pages towards the end, which didn’t help! Over all, I’m glad I read this book. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Physical abuse, Sexual violence, and Religious bigotry

Moderate: Adult/minor relationship, Body shaming, Bullying, Death, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Fatphobia, Genocide, Infertility, Mental illness, Miscarriage, Misogyny, Pedophilia, Racism, Rape, Sexism, Torture, Violence, Murder, Pregnancy, Toxic friendship, Alcohol, and Colonisation

serendipitysbooks's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional reflective medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

 Our Lady of the Nile is a boarding school, high in the Rwandan mountains, run by the Catholic church to educate and empower the daughters of Rwanda’s elite. There’s lots of traditional boarding school tropes in here - different factions of girls, late night feasts of food brought from home, minor run-ins with authority figures, a young male teacher the girls crush on. But this is Rwanda, and even though the story is set fifteen years before the devastating civil war, the ethnic divisions and tensions are ever-present and ramp up alarmingly as the novel progresses. Although the girls seem to get along, it takes just one instigator to incite major ethnic divisions and a chasm soon divides them. One key incident - vandalising the nose on a statue of the Virgin Mary so it would be replaced by one more Hutu looking- may seem humorous but the chain of events consequently triggered is anything but.

The boarding school setting provides a degree of insularity, while the remote mountain location provides isolation which is compounded in the rainy season. These both contribute to the ominous tone which pervades the novel and is appropriate for its dark subject matter.

I thought the characterisation, especially of the girls, was well done. The girls were all very distinct vibrant characters, not flat stereotypes. And I couldn’t help but be frustrated and infuriated by all the adults who let them down. They had parents who are obviously spouted discriminatory and hateful rhetoric, which the girls internalised and repeated. The schools’s priest was a sexual pervert, a nun attempted to shame them about their bodies. This is only the tip of the iceberg and much of it links back to colonialism. Race, class and gender all intersect and even if the civil war and genocide has been avoided most young women, like those portrayed here, would be presented from fulfilling their potential. Yet they did occur and this book gives insight into how and why.

All in all a thought-provoking story which demonstrates on a small-scale how large scale atrocities can occur.
 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Genocide and Sexual assault