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An Ordinary Man

4.26 of 5 stars 4.26 · rating details · 1,849 ratings · 314 reviews

The riveting life story of Paul Rusesabagina-the man whose heroism inspired the film Hotel Rwanda

As his country was being torn apart by violence during the Rwandan genocide of 1994, hotel manager Paul Rusesabagina-the "Oskar Schindler of Africa"-refused to bow to the madness that surrounded him. Confronting killers with a combination of diplomacy, flattery, and deception...more

Hardcover, 207 pages

Published April 6th 2006 by Viking Adult (first published January 1st 2006)

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Mar 25, 2009 Tahleen rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: memoirs-and-biographies

I don't know if it was because I saw the movie before reading the book, or if it was because I had been reading extremely hard books for the same class for the two weeks prior, but I just couldn't get as involved with this one. I still really liked it though, it's amazing what Rusesabagina was able to do with just liquor, a book full of contacts, and a very good sense of what needed to be said to whom--he did save more than 1,200 people during the Rwandan genocide of 1994, after all. I'd definit...more

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Aug 25, 2009 Lotte rated it 4 of 5 stars

An autoboigraphy of Paul Rusesabagina, the man who inspired the movie Hotel Rwanda. I found the movie compelling and memorable and when I saw the book on Kimberlie's list decided I really wanted to read it. Having little knowledge of Rwanda, this book provided me with enough history to understand better the forces at work in Rwanda leading to the genocide of 1994, as well as enough of Paul's personal observations on the culture, geography, and personality of the people that I felt a love for the...more

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Mar 27, 2008 Joanna rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: audiobooks, 2008-read, nonfiction, biography-memoir

First, listening to this book on audio was extremely powerful. So much so that I actually had to stop the CD, stop the car, then turn it back on to listen to because it was so moving and was making it hard for me to concentrate on driving. The author manages to use direct language to tell his amazing story of being the manager of a hotel in Rwanda during the genocide. He managed to turn the hotel into a refugee base and, amazingly, held off the militia and other killers for 76 days, saving the l...more

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Jan 20, 2012 Mike rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: biography, history

Paul Rusesabagina is an Oscar Schindler for Africa, for the late 20th century. Less than fifty years after the Nuremburg trials, with endless 'never again' promises ringing in the world's ears, a French-sponsored government killed a million people in a matter of weeks, leaving their corpses where they fell in their lust for another kill. The Clinton administration refused to help, the Mitterand presidency actively supported the killers, the Belgians bulked at the monster they had created and the...more

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Feb 13, 2013 Roger Smitter rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Near the end of An Ordinary Man, author Paul Rusesabagina sums up the genocide in Rwanda with a reminder that “the message crept into our national consciousness very slowly. It did not happen all at once. We did not wake up one morning to hear it pouring out of the radio at full strength. It started with a sneering comment, the casual use of the term “cockroach”, the almost humorous suggestion that Tutsis should be airmailed back to Ethiopia.”

This theme also turns up in book I read before An Ord...more

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Nov 28, 2012 David P rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: biography, current-events, holocaust

The book's title is a wry understatement: it is an autobiography of Paul Rusesabagina, the hotel manager whose courage, resourcefulness, shrewd tact and personal presence saved more than 1000 lives when a spasm of genocide swept Rwanda in 1994. It is the story of his entire life, from village childhood in the "country of a thousand hills" in central Africa, to reluctant exile after the genocide. If you have seen the film "Hotel Rwanda," you already know about him. But where a movie, even a powe...more The book's title is a wry understatement: it is an autobiography of Paul Rusesabagina, the hotel manager whose courage, resourcefulness, shrewd tact and personal presence saved more than 1000 lives when a spasm of genocide swept Rwanda in 1994. It is the story of his entire life, from village childhood in the "country of a thousand hills" in central Africa, to reluctant exile after the genocide. If you have seen the film "Hotel Rwanda," you already know about him. But where a movie, even a powerfully moving one, gives at most momentary glimpses, this small book paints a much more comprehensive picture. By all means, read it. Slowly.

If you have not seen the film, read the book first, then go watch it. The film itself packs an enormous emotional punch, but with the book you suddenly understand it much better. Indeed, this ought to be required reading in high schools and universities anywhere, teaching a lesson any young citizen needs to absorb when facing the 21st century. A lesson about genocide, about a willful attempt by one social group to exterminate another, and if the one of Rwanda may not have been the largest one, the authors here show (and Tom Zoellner shares full credit) that it stood out from the rest in ferocity, intensity and cruelty.

The forces which led to genocide built up over many years. Rwanda and its sister-state Burundi are two small states on the spine of Africa, enormously fertile and densely populated by two ethnic groups, the Hutus and the Tutsis. That division, Rusesabagina makes clear, was the root of the evil which followed. In the middle 1800s, the writings of explorer John Hanning Speke presented it as a fact of life, and the rest of the world accepted it without question--tall, elite Tutsis who had arrived from the east and tended animals, and squat Hutu peasant farmers from west Africa, a lower class in society. Maybe at one time such a division existed, but intermarriage and a common language and culture (many had become Christian) gradually blurred it. There was nothing unusual in Rusesabagina, a Hutu, taking a Tutsi wife.

What sustained and strengthened the division were the Belgian colonial rulers, whose identity cards demanded the bearer to be ethnically defined as Hutu or Tutsi. Dividing the country helped their rule, but it also sowed new seeds of hatred. After WW-II, when Belgium and other colonial powers left Africa, corrupt politics soon brought a general deterioration. The Hutu majority group ruled the country, and in the early 90s it launched by radio a vicious campaign of hate propaganda. A militant organization formed and weapons were hoarded, preparing to "ethnically clean" the country of its "cockroaches." Tutsis exiled to neighboring countries meanwhile established their own military force.

The storm broke in April 1994, with the murder by missile of the presidents of both Rwanda and Burundi (no one ever found who did it). What followed is hard to describe in just a few sentences. In all, about 800,000 people died within 100 days, more than a tenth of the population. Most were Tutsis, but Hutus trying to stem the hate died too. Ordinary citizens, seemingly peaceful and friendly, suddenly ganged up on their neighbors, hacking them apart with machetes, then looting their homes. At roadblocks, passengers were taken off cars and those with Tutsi identity cards were hacked to pieces, their bodies rotting by the wayside or floating down a river. The spasm of violence might have been nipped in the bud--but the UN stood aside and ordered its troops not to intervene, while France, hoping to gain political influence, actually helped arm the Hutus, and protected them after they were beaten.

All this is described in a measured, matter-of-fact language by Rusesabagina, in the tone of a citizen used to peace and order, yet forced by circumstances to face raw evil. And yet those sober, controlled words convey their message more forcefully than any outraged adjectives could do. Here is the manager of the most prestigious hotel of the capital, skilled in catering to the needs of important visitors and pleasing diverse guests in an orderly and non-obtrusive fashion--and suddenly he is in a battle zone, his hotel turned into an unarmed city of refuge. Lesser men may have tried to flee, less resourceful ones may have died--indeed, he himself was reconciled to the thought of never getting out alive. Yet he survived, as did every person in his hotel.

Luck helped, of course, again and again. But it would not have happened without the author's strong moral character, and the book also tells (what the movie does not) how that character was molded by a strict but kind family, especially by a mentoring and encouraging father. Luck alone would not have sufficed without the author's fine-tuned psychological insight. People who may seem purely evil, he tells us, often have hard and soft sides to their personality--for instance, that police chief siding with the murderers may not be completely at peace with what he is doing. Avoid judgment, find his soft side, and gently encourage it. Talk to the enemy holding a gun on you--if he converses with you, he is less likely to shoot. Bring out a bottle of good wine, share it with the general leading the gangs, and talk to him over drinks. It may help.

The film ends when all the hotel's occupants escape to the Tutsi rebels, but the book goes on, and the story is not all sunny. The Tutsi forces too were harsh, and did not always distinguish friend from foe. After they capture the capital city Kigali, many of the country's Hutus, guilty and innocent alike, flee in panic across the border. Rusesabagina's nightmare seems over: new identity papers omit any ethnic identification, and once again he manages a high class hotel.

But devastation remains. Of the family of his brother-in-law, only two little girls survive, whom he raises with his own children. Laconically he comments "I have lost four of my eight siblings. ... For a Rwandan family, this is a comparatively lucky outcome."

And the dangers remain, too: enemies are still loose, often unidentified. His life is threatened and he ends up accepting asylum in Belgium and driving a cab in Brussels. Hard work brings prosperity--another cab and more, then a trucking company in Zambia, and then quite by chance, his story is discovered and made into a film. After a delay of years, Paul is acclaimed for his heroic deeds and even invited to the White House.

But he still cannot return home. True peace continues to elude Rwanda, whose new government again seems to enter a path of cronyism and corruption, evils which preceded the genocide. It is a small country with limited area and resources, far from stable Europe and from an indifferent US. Can the past horrors happen again? The authors fear that they can, and give convincing reasons.

There is much to be learned from this honest tale, and Rosesabagina and Zoellner express it quite well. They have no solution, no one does, but if one is reached some day, this slim book has been an important contribution towards it. Read it!
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Nov 06, 2012 Doug Clark rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

An Ordinary Man is the story of Paul Rusesabagina during the genocide in Rwanda from April through July, 1994. Paul’s experiences were the inspiration for the gripping film, Hotel Rwanda starring Don Cheadle as Paul Rusesabagina. Reading Paul’s story, one realizes that even in the darkest hours of man’s brutality to other men, hope, slim as it may appear, remains.

Paul’s book has several messages. First, he emphasizes the power of words. For him, his words are what kept himself, his family, and...more An Ordinary Man is the story of Paul Rusesabagina during the genocide in Rwanda from April through July, 1994. Paul’s experiences were the inspiration for the gripping film, Hotel Rwanda starring Don Cheadle as Paul Rusesabagina. Reading Paul’s story, one realizes that even in the darkest hours of man’s brutality to other men, hope, slim as it may appear, remains.

Paul’s book has several messages. First, he emphasizes the power of words. For him, his words are what kept himself, his family, and over 1200 other people alive during the genocide. And Paul is correct. It is harder to treat someone as an object, worthless in value, if one is engaging that person in conversation. To talk to someone is to humanize him/her. However, Paul’s conversation wasn’t the only factor. He was able to offer bribes, serve drinks, and do small favors to those that held the power of life and death over him and the other refugees. Paul also received some crucial assistance from the hotel owners, the Sabena Corporation.

The second aspect of the power of words is in how the radio station, Radio-Television Libre des Mille Collines (RTLM) used words to stir up the Hutus. The hatred spewed by the station led to the genocide in large measure. With no voice to rebut the message of hate, people believed and went out to kill.

The second message Paul has is that all men, no matter how evil they appear have some good in them. His mission was to find that good and exploit it, even from the most “evil” of men.

The third message is a criticism of the West’s indifference, especially the United Nations and the United States. These criticisms are fully justifiable. Had the UN or even the US intervened early on in April, the genocide could have been avoided. As it was, the West turned their back on Rwanda. As a poor African country with no valuable resources, the West couldn’t be bothered. The Europeans and Americans were evacuated. The UN Peacekeepers were not allowed to protect the Rwandans. This was compounded by the US disaster in Somalia, now known as Black Hawk Down. In the face of the loss of American lives there, President Clinton did not feel like he had the political capital, much less the will, to involve Americans in a battle for which there were no “benefits” to the US, especially if American casualties were likely to occur.

The book itself is Rusesabagina’s autobiography. It opens with his early life in the hills (milles collines mean 1000 hills) and how he eventually becomes a hotel manager at the Diplomates, the sister hotel to the Hotel Milles Collines. Rusesabagina also gives a wonderful history of Rwanda and explains how certain years are beads on Rwanda’s necklace of history. These dates are the tragedies and missteps that led to the separation of Rwandans into two peoples: Tutsis and Hutus. This division, perpetrated by the Belgians in the 1930s, led to simmering frustrations and hatreds that exploded into the genocide that eventually cost over 800,000 people their lives. Following his beginnings, the bulk of the autobiography covers his experiences hiding refuges in the Hotel Milles Collines. This is a harrowing story of an island of refuge in a land of death.

Although Rusesabagina claims that he is only an ordinary man, a hotel manager, his courage and perseverance saved over 1200 refugees from being massacred. Ordinary? Not hardly. As a Hutu, he could have easily walked away. However, as he writes in the book, he would not have been able to sleep with himself had he done so.

In reading this book, we must ask ourselves, “What would we have done?” Whatever the answer is, the final message to us is that one man can do much. It is our choice. I strongly recommend this book. And after finishing it, Google Rwanda Darfur Similarities. Do we really want to have this happen again and do nothing?
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Oct 04, 2012 Jocelyn rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Paul Rusesabagina may be an ordinary man but he tells an extraordinary story. During the Rwandan genocide, he protected 1,268 people in the luxury hotel he was managing. His assets: a swimming pool full of water; a large supply of alcoholic beverages; a long list of important connections (many of whom owed him personal favors); a secret telephone line that was never cut; training in (and I'm sure a personal talent for) the art of negotiation. The swimming pool was for water rations. The rest was...more

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May 13, 2012 Marcy rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Paul Rusesabagina was a well trained Rwandan man, starting with his father's training, growing up in a small village. Paul developed a strong work ethic working in the fields. He was a keen observer of his father and his friends. His father modeled how to help others during times of crisis; His father offered shelter to the distressed, running for their lives. His father's words were always profound proverbs that would serve Paul well as an adult. Paul became deeply immersed in the Rwandan cultu...more Paul Rusesabagina was a well trained Rwandan man, starting with his father's training, growing up in a small village. Paul developed a strong work ethic working in the fields. He was a keen observer of his father and his friends. His father modeled how to help others during times of crisis; His father offered shelter to the distressed, running for their lives. His father's words were always profound proverbs that would serve Paul well as an adult. Paul became deeply immersed in the Rwandan culture that belonged to his father - fairness and reconciliation over banana beer.

Paul was also well trained learning to be a pastor, but discovered early on that that was not the role he wanted in life. Paul eventually became the hotel manager of Belgium's two top hotels in Rwanda, using all the knowledge that he received from his father, as a pastor, as a father and as a loving husband to run his hotels exquisitely. Paul observed and learned how the men of Rwanda talked and made deals around the pool. He learned the art of words and talk and the power of "drinking" together that effects change and controls situations. These observations served him well when Rwanda did indeed succumb to the madness of a Tutsi/Hutu divide that became a genocide. There were 800,000 Tutsi killings in 100 days due to the power of the radio and the Hutu government. Paul, as manager of the Hotel Mille Collines at that time, gathered and protected many Rwandan people who were on the list for machete extermination. Through negotiations between good people and bad outside of the hotel, Paul managed to keep people in his hotel alive during the genocide. (Paul believed that evil should always be kept in one's orbit to effect change).

Paul's reflections of genocide were quite profound. Why did the Tutsis not heed the warnings as the radio announcements became clearer that killing was on people's minds? So many Jews did not heed the warnings in Germany as Jewish stores were smashed, yellow stars were given out and rights became restricted. Paul claims that it take a lot of time for the truth to sink in. The human capacity for endurance is great.

It shamed me to read that the U.S. policymakers did little to nothing to alleviate Rwanda's problems. There was, however, a great debate over what is actually a genocide. The U.S. was not the only country to turn its back on Rwanda and other countries in need. The world will never be a better place until people all over make a stand and prevent these atrocities.

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Feb 01, 2012 Roger DeBlanck rated it 5 of 5 stars

The Rwandan genocide of 1994 happened before the blind eyes of the world. Even as warnings of the impending slaughter circulated widely in the international community, the U.N. stood down and allowed ethnic Hutus to murder their neighbors, ethnic Tutsis and also moderate Hutus. Gangs of militias, the Interahamwe, roamed the country with machetes and hacked to death over 800,000 of their countrymen. As Rusesabagina reflects in his autobiography, the end result was the fastest and most efficient m...more

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Jan 19, 2012 Mixi Rodriguez rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This book is amazing, and really this is part of history and everyone should at least know what happened during the Rwandan genocide For example, Paul is an ordinary Rwandan man who saves 1,200 lives without him receiving anything in return. One man alone can make a change in the genocide; that’s what Paul Rusesabagina did. He put his life at risk for people he did not know. He took the risk of losing his family for a thousand people he did not know. Paul is left to take care of a hotel during t...more

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Jan 13, 2012 Eboni rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This book was really good; I think that everyone should read it. It teaches you a life lesson. For example,he main character Paul Rusesabagina risked his life to save over a thousand people durning the Rwandan genocide.This is a life’s lesson because Paul stood up for what he believed in. He felt that killing his neighbors was wrong. He believed that everyone should love one another. Another good reason for reading this book is that it teaches you that you should always stand up for what you bel...more

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Aug 24, 2010 Ursula rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: biography-autobiography, nonfiction, africa, rwanda

I have to admit to being an American who knew very little about how the Rwandan genocide had come about, and in fact about the real scope of it. I am considerably more educated after having read this book.

If you've seen the movie Hotel Rwanda, you know the basic outline of how Paul Rusesabagina sheltered approximately 1,200 people in a hotel in Kigali. In the book, he tells how he did it - by calling in favors from people whose acquaintance he'd made as a hotel manager. That doesn't begin to des...more

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Nov 16, 2009 Jenna rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Edmund Burke said, "All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing."

All over Rwanda, good men made their choices. Some joined the tide of evil, succumbing to the collective madness that overcame so many Hutus. Others did nothing. And many good men stood against evil, sheltering Tutsi refugees in their homes or churches, and died for their trouble.

Paul Rusesabagina chose to stand against evil, armed with a stash of good liquor and the proverbial "little black book" --...more

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Oct 01, 2009 Kim rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: memoirs

This movie and book went in a contrary direction. The movie was made and then Paul Rusesabagina wrote the true story. Considering his weapon was words, the book feels like the ‘right’ way for him to tell the tale.

And what a tale it is. This book narrates the build up to the genocide in Rwanda and the seventy six days Paul kept 1 268 people alive and safe in his hotel. The story is told openly and plainly, without drama or exaggeration. And this makes it even more powerful and harrowing than had...more

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Jan 13, 2012 Monica MizMiz rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: haveread

The book An Ordinary Man is an incredible, inspiring true story that is a MUST READ for everyone. This book is a “must read” because Paul Rusesabagina, the protagonist, is an amazing real-life hero. He saves 2000 people at the hotel Mille Collines just by maintaining and protecting the hotel where he works. It is so inspiring to read about such a humble hero. Furthermore, The book uses Paul’s life as a parallel for Rwandan history. It was a really effective technique that drove the plot forward...more

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Jun 02, 2009 Shannon rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I couldn’t put this down. After watching Don Cheadle’s brilliant performance of Paul Rusesabagina in Hotel Rwanda, I fervently wanted to read Rusesabagina’s autobiography. This man has so much integrity; he protected 1,268 Rwandan refugees in the Hotel des Mille Collines during a period in which hundreds of thousands were brutally executed, including Hutu political moderates like him. The book begins examining the possible origins of the ethnic divide between the Tutsi and Hutu. The origin of Rw...more I couldn’t put this down. After watching Don Cheadle’s brilliant performance of Paul Rusesabagina in Hotel Rwanda, I fervently wanted to read Rusesabagina’s autobiography. This man has so much integrity; he protected 1,268 Rwandan refugees in the Hotel des Mille Collines during a period in which hundreds of thousands were brutally executed, including Hutu political moderates like him. The book begins examining the possible origins of the ethnic divide between the Tutsi and Hutu. The origin of Rwanda’s class system has little to do with appearance. Tutsis are considered to be taller, to have smaller noses, but evidence suggests they share a recent common origin (e.g., they share the language of Kinyarwanda, the same storytelling traditions, and religions). Rusesabagina believes the ethnicities developed from artificial political distinctions. He is actually considered Hutu in spite of his mother’s Tutsi heritage due to Rwanda’s patriarchal system in which ethnic identity of a child depends on the ethnic identity of the father.

British explorer John Hanning Speke used Bible passages to theorize that the Tutsi were a lost tribe of Christians while the Hutu were the cursed descendants of Noah’s son Ham. Before World War I, Germany was the colonizing power of Rwanda. It was then handed over to Belgium, and the Belgians adopted the race theories of Speke. Subsequently, Rwandans received identity cards specifying their ethnic class. Resentment slowly grew from the doctrine of Tutsi superiority and later, Hutu Power ideology emerged as a response. Due to Belgian influence, Rwanda quickly became one of the most Christian nations on the planet. Interestingly, Rusesabagina chose Paul as his baptismal name after the NT character who described himself as “all things to all people.” I found this to be the most fitting description of Rusesabagina.

This is a fantastic autobiography, exquisitely written. It illustrates the early manifestation of ethnic division, the subtle tension and irrational fear that develop from this division, the dangers of ethnic-stereotyping propaganda, and the international community’s persistent failure to act. The end of the book discusses a phrase popularized in response to the Holocaust: “Never Again.” Rusesabagina poignantly asserts that the words Never Again will persist in being one of the most abused phrases in the English language and one of the greatest lies of our time if we continue to neglect such atrocities.

This is one of my favorite passages concerning the genocide in Rwanda:

“It started as a failure of the European colonists who exploited trivial differences for the sake of a divide-and-rule strategy. It was the failure of Africa to get beyond its ethnic divisions and form true coalition governments. It was a failure of Western democracies to step in and avert the catastrophe when abundant evidence was available. It was a failure of the United States for not calling a genocide by its right name. It was the failure of the United Nations to live up to its commitments as a peacemaking body.”

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Apr 23, 2011 Adam Kranz rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: history, non-fiction

Paul Rusesabagina will be speaking at Lawrence this Monday, so I decided to pick up his Autobiography and read it in preparation, having picked it up when co-author and Lawrence alum Tom Zoellner came to speak here last year.

An Ordinary Man is powerful, touching and quite scary. Rusesabagina focuses almost exclusively on the social and political elements of the genocide. I found this noteworthy because my only previous exposure was in Jared Diamond's Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Su ...more

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Jun 23, 2009 Joanne rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: non-fiction

I don't know much about the Rwandan genocide. This book puts a very human face on the event through the words of Rusesabina, who was the inspiration for Hotel Rwanda. His story is simply amazing. Though he says humbly throughout the book that he was just "an ordinary man," he was one uniquely placed and able to save people because of the relationships he'd built and negotiation skills he'd learned as a hotel manager. He has several near-escapes that make the book impossible to put down.

He also d...more

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Jul 19, 2012 Ankur rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: 2012

Pogrom, Genocide, Ethnic Cleansing, Holocaust. These are just words for most of us, to be tut-tuted at, and then shrugged and forgotten!

And this is where the strength of this book lies - it makes us feel the horror of neighbor turning on neighbor, husband on wife, friend killing friend, all in the name of righteousness! thru the imagery conjured up by words, and the sheer hard hitting truth of deaths per hour, and how the so called leaders of the free world just sit like ostriches!

The book is su...more

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Jan 20, 2012 Heather added it

Shelves: adult, biography, humanitarianism, non-fiction, genocide, read-in-2012

This was definitely a hard book to read, but it's a book that should be read. Paul Rusesabagina writes about how he survived the Rwandan genocide and was able to protect almost 1300 people hiding in his hotel.

If you've seen Hotel Rwanda you know the jist of how things happened. I really enjoyed the details in the book though. There was a lot of history which helped to set up how a genocide could happen. It put things in context. It's pretty shocking to think that friends and neighbors would kill...more

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Apr 25, 2011 Devin Wallace rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: non-fiction, memoir

There are few people who can truly say they have saved a life. Even fewer can claim, without an ounce of fabrication, that they have saved over one thousand. Paul Rusesabagina is one such man, far less ordinary than the title of his memoir would let on. During the Rwandan genocide of 1994, Rusesabagina (then the manager of a luxurious hotel) helped keep the 1,000 plus refugees inside safe, just steps away from a bloody genocide occuring outside the front doors. The memoir is written with the cla...more

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May 13, 2009 Sheehan rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This memoir is about a self-proclaimed "ordinary man" who utilized his mind, connections and words to save over a thousand people amidst the slaughter that was the 100days genocide in Rwanda (1994). The book not only describes the genocide, but expansively addresses the social relationships of Rwandans, their political history and the importance worldwide apathy played in allowing genocide to ever occur.

A true testament to the power of conviction; Rusesabagina forgives no one their actions, but...more

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Dec 04, 2012 Libby rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: africa, biography, religion

Paul Rusesabagina became known as the man who hid "1,268 people" (pg. iv) inside the Hotel Mille Collines, in Rwanda's capital city of Kigali, in 1994. The refugees who stayed at Hotel Milles Collines were kept safe because Paul saved up gestures of goodwill as favors combined with the use of what appeared to be protection, luxury, friendly-natured relationships with Hutu leaders to stave off slaughters and other abuses from occurring at the hotel. Outside, "…800,000 people were butchered by the...more Paul Rusesabagina became known as the man who hid "1,268 people" (pg. iv) inside the Hotel Mille Collines, in Rwanda's capital city of Kigali, in 1994. The refugees who stayed at Hotel Milles Collines were kept safe because Paul saved up gestures of goodwill as favors combined with the use of what appeared to be protection, luxury, friendly-natured relationships with Hutu leaders to stave off slaughters and other abuses from occurring at the hotel. Outside, "…800,000 people were butchered by their friends, neighbors and countrymen" (pg. x). His story became the basis for a movie, "Hotel Rwanda." It was as much a story of the country's colonialist history and resulting genocide as it was about "An Ordinary Man," the name of this book, written collaboratively with Tom Zoellner.

"There was never any 'Hutu homeland' or 'Tutsi homeland.' What divided us was an invented history" (pg 16). The year 1885 was significant in Rwanda's history because it held the Berlin Conference, a meeting which enabled the Germans to carve up their stronghold in Africa without consideration of its inhabitants. During WWI, Germany had to withdraw from Rwanda and surrendered it to Belgium. Unlike the Germans, Belgium opted to colonize Rwanda, extract its resources and abuse its people. Slavery existed, but nobody called it by that name. Hutus took the brunt of the abuses because the Belgians had placed the Tutsi in power positions.

By 1993, all Rwandan were mandated to carry ethnic identification cards. As world opinion of colonialism changed, Belgium started to remove itself from Rwanda, disassociate itself from the Tutsi, and placed the Hutu in power. Paul's father had invited some Tutsi to stay with the family after the people had escaped during the practice genocide attacks of the "Hutu Revolution of 1959" (pg. 14).

In 1973, Burundi's "president ordered his armed forces to crack down on Hutu uprising, and these soldiers took their mission beyond the bounds of rationality" (pg. 19). Burundi soldiers' behavior received support in Rwanda by allowing this course of action to continue into the second country. Rwanda existed as Burundi's sister country in ethnic composition because the two used to be united as one land. The shared culture believed that paternal bloodline determined the ethnicity of one's offspring; so, this same year was when Paul's childhood friend was kicked out of their school for his paternal Tutsi heritage. Paul's father was Hutu; so at that point in history his mom's Tutsi heritage did not force Paul from school. This was one of Paul's early lessons in the cruel reality of his own country's institutionalized racism.

The author educated the reader as to the formation and audience development of Rwanda's first radio station and its long-term plan to be an integral part of both the propaganda and psychological operations of the genocide. When electricity was cut off to most areas, the station continued to perform because its energy source was connected to the Rwandan president's house. In 1994, the already-stationed UN Peacekeepers could have easily snuffed out the war at the launch of the coup due to Rwandan respect for law enforcement. Since the international soldiers were restricted to observational behavior, events escalated from small to massive-scale in a short period of time. Paul explained of how a United Nations representative from Canada, General Romeo Dallaire, wanted to cut the energy supply to the radio station. The general made every effort to suppress attacks and command a successful operation, but his senior management forbade him from progressive forms of action. This international-level decision proved to be an unwise one; "…800,000 people were butchered by their friends, neighbors and countrymen" (pg. x).

Retrospective comments about the genocide were Paul's observations pertaining to human nature. Humans are/were naturally born into a herd mentality; as such, group behaviors become routine to the extent that the ordinary business of killing loses its excitement factor. "And all genocides rely heavily on the power of group thinking to embolden the everyday killers. It is the most important commodity of all, and without it no genocide could take place" (pg. 193).

Paul asserted that genocide should never be dismissed as a country's or people's acceptable behavior. The dismissal mindset motivated international entities to remain disengaged during a critical period that most likely would have crippled the genocide.

Every story that Paul shared had a purpose. Everything in this book was deliberate. It was a gripping story with a worldwide lesson to be learned. Its valuable impact should not be trivialized.(less)

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Jul 25, 2012 Adelaide rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: drama, crime, family, friendship, history, memior, tragedy-angst

I read this book for a summer school psychology project. As a group, we decided to research and write an analysis on Paul Rusesabagina (This was also the first time I, and some of my other group mates, have heard of him). An Ordinary Man was one of the materials I used to get an insight on his behaviour and interpersonal relationships.

But I won't be summarizing what I've gotten out of An Ordinary Man for my research paper in this review. After all, it has nothing to do with my thoughts on the bo...more

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Jul 12, 2011 Bethany rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This book details the specific events that occurred around Paul Rusesabagina, the hotel manager for the Mille Collines (otherwise known by pop-culture as "Hotel Rwanda") during the 100 days of genocide in 1994. The Mille Collines became a place of refuge for over a thousand refugees seeking life during the slaughter of hundreds of thousands Tutsi's. Resesabagina eloquently uses his words (which saved the hotel from being a site of massacre) prominently at the beginning of the book and at the end...more

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Jan 03, 2010 Chenoa Siegenthaler rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This book is a very well-written account of Rusesabagina's experience as a hotel manager during the Rwandan genocide of 1994. He also explores the historical and sociological context for the events. It blew my mind. It's almost unbelievable to me that so many people could be led to do so many horrible deeds; and yet this book explores how this happened in such a way that it's a bit more within my comprehension how such things happen. I think this is a very important thing to be aware of, given t...more

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Aug 17, 2011 Bob Schmitz rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Wonderful book. I had seen the movie Hotel Rwanda and read some books on the the genocide. Paul Rusesabagina eloquently describes the history of Rwanda, the people, the landscapes, his early life as well his time at the Hotel Diplomat during the genocide. He goes on to tell of his life since that time and spends time at the end musing on the state of man and what leads to genocides and what can prevent them. It's an eloquent book about madness and its antidote. It is not recommended for the sque...more

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Jan 26, 2012 Saadiq Lane rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This is my review on the book “ An ordinary Man “ written by Paul Rusesabagina. The first reason i like this book is, it gives you a real look on what really happened behind the scenes of the media and giving facts that was not shown in the movie “ Hotel Rwanda “. He does this by giving the reader the emotions that everybody felt at that moment. Secondly, he describes abstract nouns to where u can actually picture what it looks like in your mind. By him doing this it made the book more interest...more

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Jan 13, 2012 Jennifer rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

The book An Ordinary man is a book that everyone should read! An ordinary man is about, a protagonist in Rwanda that wanted to make a difference by standing up in what he believed in. Its amazing to see how much someone is willing to give for their country. In addition while reading this book, you will see that no matter how hard the situation is u can keep on going by doing what you believe in. When you do whatever it takes to save your loved ones and all those around you, you're a hero. Best o...more

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“This is why I say that the individual's most potent weapon is a stubborn belief in the triumph of common decency.” — 6 people liked it

“Kindness is not an illusion and violence is not a rule. The true resting state of human affairs is not represented by a man hacking his neighbor into pieces with a machete. That is a sick aberration. No, the true state of human affairs is life as it ought to be lived.” — 6 people liked it

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