Ishmael Beah
A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier (2007)
Author: Ishmael Beah
Genre: Memoir (Inside Encounter)
Book Summary:
Ishmael Beah grew up in Sierra Leone. His life was first touched by war when he was twelve years old. Ishmael was on a trip to a neighboring town for a talent show when his village was attached by rebel forces. Ishmael never saw his family again. He became a homeless wanderer, travelling with other boys who were trying to escape the spreading violence and to escape being recruited into the rebel army. Eventually, Ishmael was taken captive by the government army and he soon became a soldier. As a thirteen-year-old, Beah found himself fighting savagely in the war as a junior lieutenant. The army kept Beah and his fellow soldiers fed on a steady supply of drugs, war movies, and thoughts of avenging the deaths of their family members. SPOILER: At age fifteen, Beah was taken out of the war by UNICEF and NGOs and slowly he became rehabilitated. Upon completion of his rehabilitation, he was "repatriated" and moved in with his uncle in Freetown. He had the opportunity to speak about the plight of child soldiers at a UN conference in New York City. Shortly after Ishmael returned to Sierra Leone from New York, fighting reached Freetown. The city was in a state of turmoil. Ishmael's uncle became ill. No doctors or medicines could be reached so he died. Beah, who was lucky enough to have a passport, decided to risk the difficult journey out of the country. He made it to safety, moved to the United States, completed high school and college, and now promotes his cause as a member of the Human Rights Watch Children's Rights Division Advisory Committee.
Geographical Setting: Sierra Leone
Time Period: 1993-1998
Appeal Characteristics:
The main appeal of A Long Way Gone is the incredible and eye-opening story line which follows Beah as he overcomes enormous obstacles at a very young age. The impossible situation Beah found himself in and the way that he managed to survive and heal make the story tragic, inspirational, and thought-provoking. Another major appeal element is the frame. This story is thoroughly entrenched in the unstable political situation in Sierra Leone. Only in a country full of turmoil and war could we find a story such as Beah's. Beah provides a chronology at the end of the book which details the history of political turmoil in Sierra Leone from the fifteenth century through present. Obviously, this frame affects the tone. It is bleak, foreboding, and nightmarish. However, Beah escapes in the end, so the tone is also inspirational. By the nature of the memoir genre, the story focuses primarily on one character, Ishmael Beah himself. This is his recounting of his childhood and, as such, the reader sees everything from his perspective. He is an introspective narrator, striving to tell the truth about what he did and felt, although it is not always pleasant. The book has a varied pace, ranging from measured to fast depending on the circumstances. The first half of the book is measured, describing the time Beah spent wandering the country as an orphan of the war. Once he is picked up by the army and becomes a soldier, the pace increases. After he is removed from the action, the book resumes its measured pace. Finally, it speeds up again at the end as Beah escapes the country. At times, Beah ventures into poetic descriptions, but for the most part his writing style is candid and direct. He wants his readers to understand his situation as clearly as possible.
Read-alikes: Those who found Beah's insider account of civil war interesting might also enjoy Don't Let's Go to the Dogs Tonight: An African Childhood by Alexandra Fuller. While the frame of a war-torn African country is similar, Fuller's story differs from Beah's in that it is the story of a white girl growing up in Rhodesia during the Rhodesian civil war. Fuller focuses more on racial issues and was more removed from the violence than Beah, but her story will resonate with readers who enjoy thought-provoking story lines and who are interested in the frame of children's experiences in war-torn African countries. Another story framed within a war-torn country is In the Country of Men by Hisham Matar. Unlike Beah's and Fuller's stories, In the Country of Men is a work of fiction. However, the storyline is similarly gripping and grounded in reality. Set in 1979 in Libya, this novel tells the story of a nine-year-old boy's struggle to understand the adult world after his neighbor and then his father are accused of anti-revolutionary activity. Readers who enjoyed Beah's candid writing style and the tone of his story, which was both nightmarish and (in the end) inspirational, might also enjoy Slave: My True Story by Mende Nazer and Damien Lewis. Slave recounts the story of modern-day slavery in Sudan as Nazer describes her kidnap at age twelve, her subsequent life as the slave of a wealthy Arab family in the capital city of Khartoum, and her eventual escape to freedom in London. Readers interested in learning more about the civil war in Sierra Leone might enjoy Ambushed: A War Reporter's Life on the Line by Ian Stewart. Stewart was a war correspondent for the Associated Press, covering some of the most dangerous situations in Africa. His days as a correspondent ended when he was shot in the head and his colleague was killed at a checkpoint in Freetown, Sierra Leone. Stewart's time in Sierra Leone (1998-1999) overlapped with Beah's last days in the same city. The setting is the same and the story is a memoir about overcoming obstacles but the perspective is different. It is the perspective of a reporter who must overcome his own obstacles in dealing with the horrors he has seen and in recovering from a nearly fatal injury. Readers who wish to learn more about the causes of the civil war in Sierra Leone might want to read Greg Campbell's Blood Diamonds: Tracing the Deadly Path of the World's Most Precious Stones. Campbell describes the world of diamond smuggling and the ways that the diamond industry has contributed to the brutal civil war in Sierra Leone. Campbell's book puts Beah's story in context, providing more historical detail and more description of life in the world in which Beah grew up. For those that enjoyed the direct writing style and engrossing pace of A Long Way Gone, try Girl Solider: A Story of Hope for Northern Uganda’s Children by Faith J.H. McDonnell and Grace Akallo. Akallo was forced to march with the rebel army in Uganda at the age of 15, and her story reads similar to Beah's. However, Girl Soldier is not just a personal account of being a child soldier, as McDonnell interweaves chapters recounting the history of Ugandan conflicts throughout the book. God Grew Tired Of Us: A Memoir, by John Bul Dau and Michael Sweeney, is another personal story about how war destroys lives. At the age of 13, Dau was separated from his family because of the civil war in southern Sudan, and spent years in refugee camps before coming to the U.S. in 2001. Just like A Long Way Gone, Dau's story is told using simple prose, and while the tone of the book is dark, the ending of the story is hopeful, as Dau is reunited with his family after 19 years. Another book to try would be Child of the Jungle: The True Story of a Girl Caught Between Two Worlds by Sabine Kuegler. At the age of 8, Kuegler moved from Germany to the "Lost Valley" in Indonesia, where the primitive Fayu tribe resides. This is a memoir of her childhood spent there, and really shows the dichotomy of living a life of tranquility in the jungle while battling the constant underlying fear that war would break out between the four hostile subtribes of the Fayu. Child of the Jungle features long passages describing the jungle that are reminiscent of A Long Way Gone, as well as a conversational writing style. For those who are interested in learning more about child soldiers around the world, try P.W. Singer's Children at War. Singer performed a comprehensive study of child soldiery, through interviews with former child soldiers, adults who have fought against them and adults who have tried to rehabilitate children forced into warfare. While the aim of the book is more analytical than A Long Way Gone, Children at War reads at a compelling pace and the overall tone is dark; however, Singer is hopeful that his study will help those trying to end child soldiery. For those interested in reading a fiction title that contains similar themes to A Long Way Gone, try Sold by Patricia McCormick. The story is about 13-year-old Lakshmi, who is sold into prostitution in India. The writing style is more lyrical than A Long Way Gone, but while this is a fictional account, the story reads like Beah's and is just as compelling. The tone of the novel is bleak and features extremely brutal scenes, but ends on a hopeful note, when Lakshmi is rescued by Americans.
Red Flags: Excessive violence, drug use, and exploitation of children.
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