Book Review - A Long Way Gone

I recently finished reading A long Way Gone. The first time I started reading this book was over a year ago. I got through the first chapter and had to put it down. It was too sad.

The book, subtitled “Memoirs of a Boy Soldier,” tells the story of Ishmael Beah a young boy from Sierra Leone caught in the middle of one of the most brutal and violent revolutions in recent, while only twelve years old. Beah is a wonderful writer who gives his readers a clear and moving picture of each of the circumstances he encountered on his journey as a boy who goes from fearing the violence of the civil war in Sierra Leone to reveling in the torture of other human beings after being recruited by the government army at the age of thirteen.

This is not a book for the faint of heart. Over half of Beah’s narrative chronicle how easy it is for a normal boy to become addicted to hate, killing, and drugs. Some of the more disturbing moments are the shooting or slitting people's throats without remorse or even a second thought.

After two years of fending for himself in a kill or be killed atmosphere UNICEF pulls Beah, as well as many other boys, too safety. This is where the autobiography lacks detail. We simply get a glimpse of what it took to free Beah of his addictions and how he actually got to New York.

In all fairness I must mention that this book is not without controversy. The Australian has published several articles debunking the memoir and alleging that Ishmael Beah extremely embellished the facts. According to journalist working for the paper Beah’s timeline is exaggerated. Instead of Beah’s village being annihilated in 1993 as Beah purports, the reporters contend that the village was in fact in not raided until 1995; making Beah an orphan soldier for little more than two months.

Without making a call as to the authenticity of the books timeline I will say that if you have the heart, or stomach as the case may be, this is an informative look into what happens to children of war in third world countries.