Book Review - Strength in What Remains (Audio)

Strength in What Remains by Tracy Kidder, Audio CD, Publisher: Random House Audio; Unabridged edition (August 25, 2009), ISBN-10: 073938337X

Rating: 4.5 of 5 STARS
Source: Public Library

This is simply a great book. Pulitzer Prize winner Tracy Kidder tells us the story of Deo, a young Burundian medical student, who escapes the violence of the Burundi/Rwandan genocide to New York in the mid 1990's. With $200 in his pocket, unable to speak any English, and no friends or contacts, he stumbles his way through the city, trying to find a way to survive. Sleeping in Central Park, delivering groceries for $15 a day, and suffering terrible flashbacks of the horrors he had witnessed, somehow Deo manages to attend Columbia University and become a U.S. citizen. Well, it's not as simple as that. There's a lot in between. He meets people along the way who selflessly help him, give him housing, and help pay his expenses.

It's not only the story of Deo in New York. Kidder gives us the back-story - the story of the Tutsis and Hutus. I watched Hotel Rwanda a few years ago and was completed staggered by it. I remember thinking, "Where was I when this was happening? Why didn't I know?" It was the same as I listened to this book. How could I not have known this massacre was happening? In 1994, I had a 7 year-old son and 1 year-old daughter and had just moved from Louisiana to North Carolina to start a new career. I can't imagine my life was going on normally while hundreds of thousands of people were dying. I don't know. It's just stunning to me that these two groups of people hated each other so.

Tracy Kidder reads the book himself. It's not the best audio I've listened to, but Kidder does a good job overall. He definitely didn't detract from the story, but I think someone else could have given a little more inflection and dramatization to the voices.

Overall, it's a definite "must-listen." :-) Enjoy!