A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier
A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier
Author: Ishmael Beah
Desc: The devastating story of war through the eyes of a child soldier. Beah tells how at the age of twelve he fled attacking rebels and wandered a land rendered unrecognizable by violence. By thirteen he’d been picked up by the government army and became a soldier. My new friends have begun to suspect I haven’t told them the full story of my life. “Why did you leave Sierra Leone?” “Because there is a war.” “You mean you saw people running around with guns and shooting each other?” “Yes all the time.” “Cool.” I smile a little. “You should tell us about it sometime.” “Yes sometime.” This is how wars are fought now: by children hopped-up on drugs and wielding AK-47s. Children have become soldiers of choice. In the more than fifty conflicts going on worldwide it is estimated that there are some 300 000 child soldiers. Ishmael Beah used to be one of them. What is war like through the eyes of a child soldier? How does one become a killer? How does one stop? Child soldiers have been profiled by journalists and novelists have struggled to imagine their lives. But until now there has not been a first-person account from someone who came through this hell and survived. In A Long Way Gone Beah now twenty-five years old tells a riveting story: how at the age of twelve he fled attacking rebels and wandered a land rendered unrecognizable by violence. By thirteen he’d been picked up by the government army and Beah at heart a gentle boy found that he was capable of truly terrible acts. This is a rare and mesmerizing account told with real literary force and heartbreaking honesty.