When I picked up this book I really didn't know what to expect. I knew about the slave trade from my high school history classes but I was never taught about what was happening across the world in Africa. This novel presented to me a new world and a different look at history. A view from people in distress and missery.
I found this novel to be full of wordful images of gruesome slature and beating. This was a lifestyle I have never piered into. This book showed me that even in this day in age there are still evils in the world promoting us to harm others for our own well being and status. I have gain a new respect for the things that I hold dear and the cush lifestyle I have been blessed with.
There were many quotes in the first half of this book that really shook me up because of the truth behind them. There is a few lines on page 129 that really eye opening. The part I am talking about it where Father Achte is with a group of rebels and they treat him with a bit more respect than he was expecting and he learns of their hardships. "With his own hands poured salt and pepper on the bloody wounds made by the chicotte and ordered the sick from his post thrown alive into the Lualaba River." This passage really showed me how cold hearted and ignorant the white men in Africa where. Kill a lot to gain a little. Great motto. 
2 comments:
You write such a great line "wonderful images of gruesome slaughter and beating". Such a poet and true line, I may have to steal it for my own use.
"kill a lot to gain a little" is almost an understatement of the book. I mean killing MILLIONS of people for some land eventually taken back is sooooo ridiculuous! I can't imagine pouring salt into the wounds.. I mean seriously kill me right then and there. Talk about cruel and unusual punishment.
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