A Sunday at the Pool in Kigali - Hardcover

“This novel is not only powerful and beautifully written. Corrosive, denunciatory, Un dimanche à la piscine à Kigali also evokes the powerlessness and the complicity that permitted the [Rwandan] massacre to take place.” -- Le Devoir

“A voice that evokes humanity in all its depth and breadth, where executioner and victim are brother and sister, where death is a daily occurrence. A voice I implore you to listen to.... Through a felicitous mix of reportage and fiction, Courtemanche has powerfully portrayed a lucid character deeply engaged in a humanist quest.... The many facets of Bernard Valcourt’s eye constitute the richest prism of the book since he so ably expresses the complex malaise that can be the fate of a western white man faced with Rwandan culture in full decline.” -- Le Journal de Montreal

“A strong, assured voice...speaking of present day and tragic realities: AIDS and the Rwandan genocide–sicknesses of body and spirit with which men and women live, love, die and triumph.... A novel stuck on reality that nevertheless transcends it. You will recognize places and characters. You will recognize the mugginess of the climate. But Courtemanche’s fiction transmits the depth of the real better than any objective documentation.” -- Relations

“Those who read this novel -- and I hope they will be numerous -- are in for some astonishing pages on the subject of love and death.” -- David Homel, Books in Canada

“Exceptional.” -- Jean-Paul Dubois, Le Nouvel Observateur

“A captivating first novel...Gil Courtemanche’s fine writing and refined style... weave together a love story full of beauty and tenderness.” -- Voir

“A first novel whose story hits hard, very hard.” -- Le Droit

“A tremendous novel.” -- René Homier-Roy, Radio Canada/C’est bien meilleur le matin

“A few pages are enough for you to be swept away into the terrifying madness of a country.” -- Le Nouvel Observateur

“When your first novel is compared to the works of Albert Camus, André Malrauz and Graham Greene, it’s a pretty good start. The book is set in Kigali, the capital of Rwanda, just before the genocide of the Tutsis at the hands of the Hutu-led government. There is a sense of disaster foretold as these men and women, white and black, play out their last days around a hotel swimming pool in a city that will soon become a graveyard. Courtemanche’s novel is guided by a strong moral presence: that of the author. He has an astringent personality, and he puts it to good use in this book...” -- The Gazette

“Journalist Courtemanche follows in Graham Greene’s footsteps to create popular work that distinguishes itself on the literary scene.” -- David Homel, Enycyclopedia Brittanica

“A fresco with humanist accents which could easily find a place next to the works of Albert Camus and Graham Greene.” -- La Presse

“A Sunday at the Pool in Kigali is a blunt, vividly visual account of a human cataclysm that has left a scar on the psyche of us all. At the same time it is a testament to love, its durabilility and frailty in the face of annihilation. Do not expect it to leave you untouched.” -- Jonathan Kaplan, author of The Dressing Station

A Sunday at the Pool in Kigali is a moving, passionate love story set amid the turmoil and terror of Rwanda's genocide.
All manner of Kigali residents pass their time by the pool of the Mille-Collines hotel: aid workers, Rwandan bourgeoisie, expatriates, UN peacekeepers, prostitutes. Keeping a watchful eye is Bernard Valcourt, a jaded foreign journalist, but his closest attention is devoted to Gentille, a hotel waitress with the slender, elegant build of a Tutsi. As they slip into an intense, improbable affair, the delicately balanced world around them-already devastated by AIDS-erupts in a Hutu-led genocide against the Tutsi people. Valcourt's efforts to spirit Gentille to safety end in their separation. It will be months before he learns of his lover's shocking fate.