"This is a story from the Rwanda of 1994. Life was difficult enough in Rwanda for a boy in the early 1990s, and Faustin's father did not make it any easier with inexplicable rules and dark secrets. Teachers at school began to emphasize the division between the Tutsis and Hutus, a division that made its way to the soccer field"--Back cover.
The author, a political officer at the U.S. Mission to the United Nations from 1993 to 1994, shares his opinions about the United Nations' failure to intervene in the Rwandan genocide, and argues that the bureaucratic culture of the organization allowed the U.N. to ignore its ethical commitment to try to stop the killings.
Rwandan runner Jean Patrick Nkuba dreams of winning an Olympic gold medal and uniting his ethnically divided country, only to be driven from everyone he loves when the violence starts, after which he must find a way back to a better life.
Introduces the geography, history, government, industries, culture, and people of the small country, located in the mountains of east-central Africa, which gained independence in 1962.
