This book about the boy soldiers of recent wars in Africa was especially meaningful for us because we lived in neighboring Liberia for 2 years just before the wars broke out. We were teaching school up "in the bush", and some of the boys thought it would be wonderful to be soldiers when they grew up. Well, they did not have time to grow up before the wars came and they were conscripted. The first hand account by Ishmael Beah matches what is published and/or shown about the war events in other countries. With the current attraction of our boys in the US to video "war games", they need to read what life is really like for boys in other countries. Parents need to know and make sure their children are aware of the plight of children in much of the world. It would counteract the huge desire for more things and entertainment here, and perhaps would cause our youth to be caring and benevolent to the many causes there are to help the unfortunate of the world.

This book is disturbing and for that reason should be on the short list of required texts for college. Unlike the WWI and WWII war books which read like ancient history this one hits close to home as most of the events transpired within the last decade. The author does a great job of telling his story from a boys point of view with imagery that will give you nightmares.

If you cannot handle reading about graphic violence, rape, murder, wartime atrocities, then do not buy this book. Otherwise it is a good companion to the Blood Diamond movie which covers some of the same material.

In this autobiography, A Long Way Gone, Ishmael Beah tells the story of his Civil War experience. In his tragic story, Beah is trying to share his struggles with the world so that people are aware of what had happened to children in Seria Lone.
Throughout the book Ishmael looses his parents, sister, brother, and friends. For a month or so he is alone until he finds a new group of boys. These boys go though a lot together and end up becoming close friends. Later in the book they find a campsite that is willing to supply them with food and shelter, just what the boys need, in return for one thing; they had to become soldiers to help protect that campsite from the rebels. Ishmael had never planned on becoming a soldier so he was a little hesitant at first, but finally agreed. . As the months went on, Ishmael started to learn to love his life as a soldier and didn't want to give it up, until one day when he had no choice. Ishmael was picked up by a rehab center that helped children stay away from war. He finds out that life outside of the war is a lot different.
Ishmael did a great job in explaining his experience without leaving out any details. I felt his struggle and his emotion that came with it while I was reading his book.
Personally, I loved this book. Most of the time it was hard to put down. As a high school student, the book's descriptions were so vivid and realistic that it almost felt as if it were a movie. I would definitely recommend this book to anyone who enjoys a good nonfiction book that is hard to put down.

This book is so interesting that it is hard to put down and if all of this is true that these boys went thru it; it's more amaizing that the human body and mind can go thru so much and survive with some sort of humanity.

A Long Way Gone is a memoir of Ishmael Beah's days as a child soldier in Sierra Leone. Some reviewers have questioned the accuracy of the details...I read this book with an open mind, realizing that this book details the author's memories of the events he experienced as a child soldier. Beah is a good storyteller, and effectively illustrates the horrifying reality of living in a country where the government is so vulnerable to rebel forces. The details are vivid, and at times, very difficult to read. I cannot fathom how traumatic it must have been to see so many people killed, and to be one of the killers. This is Beah's story, and the fact of the matter is that what happened to Beah is going on in other countries today, and everyone needs to be aware of it. This book should be required reading in middle and/or high school. An incredible story.

I found this book to be quite harrowing: I frequently had to put it down and cool off, so troubling was the stuff I was reading.

But that was only up to about page 50 or so. After that it became a lot easier to stomach.

Why page 50? Because that's when I went to the internet and learned a little bit about the book's author, Ishmael Beah.

In short, Beah, while he apparently did undergo some rather unpleasant experiences in his native Sierra Leone, evidently did not undergo all the experiences related in "A Long Way Gone," or at least not directly. Many journalists have labeled this book a fraud.

If you'd like to find out about the controversy yourself, start with his Wikipedia page. Follow the links at the bottom.

Anyhow, some observations:

1. Beah has to be a world-class moron for not grasping that playing fast and loose with the truth in the age of the Internet is something that would later come back to haunt him. And don't tell me he was an untutored villager who had no way of understanding the implications of this: he was a student at Oberlin.

2. If Beah had simply pulled a Frederick Exley and said, "Hey, folks, this is a fictionalized autobiography. I'm not so much interested in the precise truth of events so much as the effect they had on my spirit and development." He would be untouchable.

3. This irony is certainly not deliberate, but you know how the central thrust of the book is that after an endless parade of horrors, you get inured? After pages and pages of blood, several limbs, and mutilated bodies, you pretty much stop caring. It's like you're an armchair boy soldier!

4. Beah should be despised, not "addressing the U.N." True, he may have "forgiven himself" in some feel-good workshop, but I for one haven't forgiven him. Look, if they gave him a Kalashnikov when he was 7 or 8 and bullied him into shooting up the town, that'd be one thing. But 15? That's old enough to know the difference between right and wrong in any culture. Murderer.

Ishmael Beah has written an amazing memoir called A Long Way Gone, which tells the story of his life as a child soldier in Sierra Leone. This is a book that everyone should take the time to read, because it will really teach you a lot about the current problem worldwide, with young kids being drugged, traumatized, and allowed to wield guns and fight in wars.

Ishmael experienced all the events in this book firsthand, and his story is utterly captivating. He moved to the United States in 1998 and finished high school in New York at the United Nations International School. In 2004 he graduated Oberlin College, and has spoken in front of many major world organizations that help fight for the estimated 300,000 children being used to fight in wars around the world today.

Ishmael accomplished exactly what he wanted by writing this book- he informed hundreds of thousands of people about the horrible lives that child soldiers lead all around the world. People need to look into this problem and become informed about it so that they can help organizations like UNICEF prevent it. There are thousands of young children whose lives are being taken away from them, and they are being exposed to violence. This is something no child should ever have to go through.

This book has many strengths, including things like its plot, which will make it very hard to put the book down, and all the information it gives you about wars fought in Sierra Leone. I think the only weakness was the writing style- Ishmael should have been a little bit more descriptive in his writing, and used more descriptive words to give you a better visual picture in your head of what was going on. Over all, A Long Way Gone is an outstanding true story that will teach you about the lives of child soldiers.

I found this book to be very good. I would have enjoyed it more if I read it without so much time in between reading. I would highly recomment this book. It is filled with stories that will tear your heart apart and stories that will really make you appreciate your own life.

A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier

This is an excellent bio. I look forward to the rest of the story.

Ishmael Beah's story about a boy who fled his village, was on the run for several months, and then ended up as a boy soldier for more than two years before being rescued by UNICEF workers is too incredible to be real... which is exactly why I didn't buy it at all when I read it.

I realize there are child soldiers out there in war torn developing countries. It's tragic, and it's also a good thing that someone shed light on the situation. However, A Long Way Gone reads less like a memoir, and more like a Hollywood movie. Everything in the book happens as though it were written on a script. He barely missed reuniting with his entire family because he got to their new village just moments after rebels attacked. He just happened to overhear their conversation about "it was a good attack because no one survived. We got them all!" As someone else mentioned, the cassettes in his pockets just happened to fall out of his pocket, miraculously, in the nick of time to save his life... TWICE. He was nearly stabbed by a rebel boy, but his friend stabbed the boy in the back... just in the nick of time, again.

The book is also bursting with inaccuracies and contradictions. Ishmael claims his was forced to flee his village in 1993. Because of my initial distrust of the details in his memoir, I decided to google the book. I had no idea so many people had done extensive investigations into the claims he makes in his story. Apparently, Ishmeal is the only person from his village that seems to think the attacks in his village happened in 1993. Everyone else there knows they started in 1995. They've even backed this up with school documents showing that he was in school, when Ishmael claims he was on his own running for his life. This means that if he was in the army, at most it could have only been for a few months (which is still more than any 15 year old boy should have to deal with). Also, despite the fact that several UNICEF workers at that time in Sierra Leon were interviewed and had said that an uprising at one of their camps, which resulted in six killed, would have been a major ordeal in the country, not a single one of them can recall that ever happening.

The contradictions I mentioned could simply be the result of bad editing. This is one of the worst edited books I've ever read. As Ishmael is not a native English speaker, the blame for that should be his editor's. For example, in one chapter he talks about a town where him and his friends (the second group he encounters before he's taken into the army) were captured and taken before a village chief who would decide whether they lived or died. In the very next village, the same thing happened (this is where his cassettes saves him for the second time). He then remarked on how this had happened to him a lot. He wondered whether or not it was the first time for his other friends. Except, he JUST SAID IT DID! Ugh!

In addition to all this fun stuff, there are all kinds of typos. Like I said, this book is so poorly edited, the editors should rethink their career path. Things such as "reasons" being printed where it's obvious the word meant was "seasons". It was something obvious like "the change of reasons". Then there's also redundancies all over the place. Stuff similar to "I'm going to America to speak at a conference in New York in America. It's a conference for child humanitarian issues in America." You would think the editor would weed these things out to improve the flow.

Despite all this, non-fiction or fiction, I still think it's an interesting story and an important one to tell. If the editing was better, it would have been so painful to read, but it did hold my interest mostly. I wish it was billed as "based on true events" or something like that. Instead the author claims it is 100% factual... which it is not.

A Long Way Gone: Memoir of a Boy Solider is a book that exposes the horrors of war from a child's perspective. Yet, unlike the account of an observer, this power book is the story of a boy who fought in the Sierra Leon Civil War. As a reader, it is impossible to be emotionally callous when immersing oneself in this book's pages, since its author presents a picturesque, emotive, and humane narration of his three years as a boy solider.

Beah's writing style makes it difficult for the reader to put-down this book once it has been picked-up. The language is simple yet descriptive and informative. Likewise, the author's timeline layout of the book provides a realistic approach to the telling of his story, since all chapters are rationally connected.

There are many times in the book that I was moved to tears by the heinous actions that Ishmael had to endure as a boy solider. Whether it was the death of his family, seeing his friends die in the frontline, or having to drug himself to make sense of his world, I was able to empathize with Beah's feelings of frustration, confusion, despondency, and fear.

I strongly recommend this book to everybody. As a work which speaks of the draconian reality of war -a human invention-, I feel there is no person who will not benefit from reading it. This book will make the reader reflect on his/her own life, and how tragedy, perseverance, and faith -non/religious- can drastically change ones life.

Imagine, you live in a village; you know, the ones without electricity and plumbing? You get water from the river for your mother so she can cook dinner but, when you come back, the village is ablaze and everyone is running. Not just running in one direction but everywhere; screaming, yelling, falling down dead.

This is what causes Ishmael Beah's childhood to be lost.

Beah starts out as a quiet, peace-loving boy who suddenly is on the run from all the destruction and terror with his older brother, Junior, and some friends. After months of wandering on paths and in the forest, they come to a farm outside of a village. Beah finds out his family is in the village and as a group they start walking. Then the rebels attack and his family is dead.

Torn, tired, and angry, Beah will eventually lose everything he cared about; his family, his health (both mentally and physically), and almost his life. As a boy soldier recruited by the Sierra Leone Army he changes drastically. Drugs, energy stimulants, and other illegal acts (in the United States) cause him to kill without thinking, never even cringing at
the sight of death and basically causing him to feel almost inhuman.

A LONG WAY GONE is Ishmael Beah's memoir based on his experiences and the tragic events of his life. I loved this book because it was a huge eye-opener about the war in Sierra Leone and how it affected everyone, even children. I also believe that everyone should read this book at least once in their life time. Maybe then people can help those who have become boy soldiers or anyone affected by a war. Maybe A LONG WAY GONE could change the world, make it a more peaceful place; that is what I hope can happen.

Reviewed by: Rachel - The Class

Great Book! A Long Way Gone receives a lot of criticsm as book b/c the author, whose second language is Englsih, wrote the book at a "low and simple" level. As an audio book, the author's native accent and culture shine through really adding to the power, message, and personal connection you make with the story. I loved it, and could not be happier that I purchased this audio book. It's sad yet hopeful, and will twist your emotions. Great book for just about anyone!

I expected this book to be filled with descriptions of blood and gore from beginning to end and wondered if it was really worth reading. Though the book contains its share of horrible war stories, it's much more than that. We learn about Ishmael's life before war, and how war can creep up on a perfectly normal child. We hear about his flight from war, and what happened after he escaped violence. The war itself is only a small section of the book, though, of course, the war and its effects define Ishmael's life in the book.

Reading A Long Way Gone, you learn a little about what Africa is like in peace and war and the difference between city and countryside. Ishmael explains why he does what he does, and he is very easy to relate to and understand throughout. Overall, it's a great read.

A Definite page turner! Couldn't sleep till i was done reading it. So poignantly written. It made me take a look at myself and humanity! Thanks Ishmael but I wish he would have talked about how he adjusted in the US. All the same, a must read!

A fascinating and well written account of a phenomenon few of us know much about. What an extraordinary young man.

This was a very heart wrenching book. A recommend for everyone so people are made aware of the atrocities of war. Even thought you are made aware of the terrible situations you understand how people cope in how ever bizarre a manner.

This book has good description and is an 'easy read'. It had a very interesting story about a boy in Sierra Leone and what changes his life.

I was really interested in this book and thought it was very well written. I would have given it 5 stars, but it was very disappointing how Ishmael ended the book!

An inspirational story. This young man lost his family, his home, his innocence, but managed to start over.

"Killing was as easy as drinking water" is the analogy Ishmael Beah uses to describe his time as a child soldier in the war-ravaged country of Sierra Leone. His memoir is a hard read, but a must read. The descriptions and details made me want to believe his tale was fiction, but sadly I knew it was not. Truth can be shocking and horrifying, but sobering as well.
Ishmael lost everything due to the war and was then recruited as a soldier for the government. The government! I have read countless stories about child soldiers for rebel armies, but this was news to me. These so-called government troops gave children the option of starving and going it alone or being taken care of by joining the army. High on drugs to the point of insomnia, the children were trained to fight anyone outside of their troop.
Reading this book made me angry. I felt a lot of emotions I don't like to feel. But to read this book and not feel those emotions is a crime. We in America need to be exposed to more stories like Ishmael's because we have more power to invoke change.
Ishmael was one of the lucky ones. UNICEF was able to rehabilitate him. Most child soldiers die, but even some who end up at a rehabilitation camp never heal. Many go back to the front lines because war is the only reality they know. Childhood memories have long been washed away with blood.
I urge you to read this book to educate yourself on issues not directly related to you. Read this book to feel someone else's pain. Read this book to see how the rest of the world often lives. Read this book to be grateful of where you live. And finally, read this book and refuse to forget Ishamel.

this book was extremely enlightening and disturbing...very hard to believe this is STILL going on!

This is not a book for the faint of heart. It's descriptions at times are so graphic, so realistic, it is if you are their beside the characters enduring the fate that awaits. It is very well written.
I easily became engrossed and didn't want to put it down, although i was honestly disappointed with the ending, finishing all too soon with not enough information to satisfy.
I have no trouble recommending this book to others, knowing they will take something away from the heart moving read. Matter of fact i have brought copies already and have given them as gifts, with one friend saying it was awesome, and is up their as one of the best books he has read.
Don't pass it up, READ NOW!! and i can only hope you will be motivated to want more for the youth of the world.

I found the book to be very interesting and revealing of what young boys who are forced to kill others must do to survive. I had never realized what they go through and the rehabilitation they need to cope with their feelings afterward. To lose their parents first and then experience the need to run for their lives gives us as free citizens the appreciation of the freedoms we enjoy.

Fair warning, this story will make you shiver. Emerging from the pages like an inverted Mark Twain novel, it reveals the tale of a young boy named Ishmael Beah and his horrific journey through early adolescence in war ravaged Sierra Leone in the 1990s. It's not the high octane carnage, sadistic ingenuity, or pervasive sense of evil that render this book more terrifying than a Stephen King/Dean Koontz collaboration. It's the fact that it's real, the candid recollections of an innocent kid caught in the vise of hell and abandoned there. This, the narrative illustrates with chilling authenticity, is how demons are made.

Beah's transformation from a hip hop loving twelve year old with low slung pants into brutal, bloodthirsty automaton takes place in stages, after his village is attacked and brutalized by rebel forces battling Sierra's Leone's military government. Stripped of his family, his possessions, and through hunger, terror, and exhaustion, of all hope for escape, Beah strips himself down to an essential survivalist core. In the process, the most basic empathies that define a human being peel away, and the stark dictum of kill or be killed becomes the only rule that matters.

Co opted by the guerilla forces ravaging the countryside, Beah and his young friends become soldiers, outdoing each other in acts of violence the way most twelve year olds compete at baseball. Fueled by drugs and the adrenaline of survival, they bond with their overseers with the fervor of a championship high school football team. Their banter with each other becomes ever more obscene, still peppered as it is with the playful ripostes of youthful rivalry. But though the narrative style of simple declarative sentences and innocent exclamations remains consistent throughout, we observe changes in these children that makes us fear them, even at the remove of ink on page. They become monsters.

Only once removed from the situation by a UN sponsored NGO does the depth of the damage done to these young souls reveal itself in unvarnished form. Contemptuous of humanity, seriously addicted now to amphetamines and to their commanders' approval, they're dangerous to each other and anyone who comes in contact with them, including their naive rescuers. Months pass before even the most rudimentary chinks can be observed in their armor of callous cruelty. In time, change happens. But we have no way of knowing how deep the scars will go.

One of the most frightening aspects of this book, aside from its unflinching authenticity, is that fact that there are no good guys. The conflicts destroying Sierra Leone are like a jumbled chess set of all one color, with no sense at all of who carries the banner of morality, or even simple humanity. One hopes that Ishmael Beah has banished the last of his nightmares with the publication of his book. But it's more likely that he's just passed them all along to us, and that the monsters live on.

The power of the human being to survive even the harshest of environments! This book talks about how kindness can bring us back from the brink of hell. An amazing story. I wish it was not true.

The power of the human being to survive even the harshest of environments! This book talks about how kindness can bring us back from the brink of hell. An amazing story. I wish it was not true.

The courage of this boy and his experiences will live in your heart and mind. He describes his life as a boy soldier in such a detailed and eloquent style that you can read the horrors of his life without feeling an insult to your sensitivities. He lays his emotions bare and you love him. I had no idea these conditions existed for children. I am always amazed at the strength and tenacity of human beings. This book adds to that store of amazement. Read it, it does not disappoint.

This book is a good read. It is a an eye opener to read about these kids in Africa.

This book is a good read. It is a an eye opener to read about these kids in Africa.

I finished this book in 2 days. It is a must read for anyone. I definately have a richer appreciation for life. There is always someone, somewhere who has it tougher than we do.

I loved this book. The author gives a very vivid description of his experiences in war. It was a big reminder of the consequences of war and terrorism. The last half of the book was a little slow and didnt keep my interest as much as the first half.

Unbelievable story told through the eyes of a 12 year old boy. I read some of the negative reviews posted on this website related to this book. The reviewers felt his (the author) facts weren't true and some things were impossible to have happened. I want to dispell any commentary surrounding this. Remember, this is being told from a 12 year old child's perspective. It brings awareness to the despicable acts humans place upon each other. And, as always, the most central question remains: What will we do about it? Probably nothing. At the very least, read the book. Then, watch Blood Diamonds. The scenes in which boy soldiers are shown are based on the fact presented in this book.

A heart wrenching story told in a simple yet elegant way.Ishmael really proved that "Children can outlive their sufferings, if given a chance".I wonder how many more Ishmael's are yet to be discovered from countries like Sierra Leone. A must read book.

A heart wrenching story told in a simple yet elegant way.Ishmael really proved that "Children can outlive their sufferings, if given a chance".I wonder how many more Ishmael's are yet to be discovered from countries like Sierra Leone. A must read book.

Rarely has a book had such an impact on me. Ismael Beah's epic journey from carefree childhood to inhuman adolescence to enlightened adulthood tells the story of hope for mankind. As Beah has said, it puts a human voice to the war and violence in his country of Sierra Leone, and, in the larger perspective, to all violence, war and hatred around the world. I heard Ismael Beah speak in person yesterday at Florida Gulf Coast University where he addressed the incoming freshmen with his message of love and hope. In the tradition of his people, he is a true storyteller and he tells his story with conviction. If ever a book should be read by everyone living in today's world, this is it.

very hard to put this book down, heart wrenching and difficult to read at times, but worth every minute of it. Very well written

I have no doubt that Beah experienced things that I can't imagine and that no child should see, but he writes it poorly. I am all for stories, which is why I read, but think they need to be told well. A given medium needs to be done properly to be most effective. Beah does it poorly. I'd give his book a D. He tells his story so badly that the reader has no idea the point, plot, relevance, or validity of the story. In no way do I want to make light of what he experienced, but he did it so poorly that he did a disservice to all books. This was a waste of the paper it was printed on.

Never in my life have I been so involved in a book as this one. For one person to have actually lived this life it is amazing to me. A wonderfully written book.

This book should be read by every teenager in the United States and there parents. Our children of today think life is so hard on them. If they read this book as written by someone who had life turned upside down on them and came out with a purpose they would know that they have a pretty good life in the USA. He will never be able to get his childhood back but can now recover from the things no child should have to see or go through.

I really enjoyed this book he made you think that he was a "storyteller of his village". I do wish that he had added a couple of chapters at the end on how he is doing today and what he is going to do next.

I really liked the book. Its a story that needs to be told and Mr Beah does a great job of relating his experiences as a solider in Sierra Leone. Enlightening and heartbreaking. Highly recommended

A Long Way Gone chronicles the life of a young teen in Sierra Leone who is fleeing the Rebels who are wreaking havoc in villages throughout the region. He falls in with a group of boys trying to survive, but since everyone is suspicious of groups of boys, they live a hard life. Eventually they, between the ages of 14 and 17, are conscripted into the Army to fight the Rebels.

The book is very well written. It is intense, gripping and honest. You will be amazed what was transpiring in Sierra Leone less than a decade ago. This, like so many tragedies in Africa, didn't get a lot of press until after the fact.

If you ever think you have a lot of problems or find yourself complaining a lot, you will gain a lot of perspective from this book. It is a short book (about 250 pages) and so engrossing that you will probably finish in just a few sittings. I haven't read a book this good in quite a while. Highly recommended.

Caveat: this book is not for the faint of heart. If books got ratings like movies, this would easily get an "R" rating - the war it describes is not pretty. However, I felt the book was well done and does not unnecessarily dwell on anything unpleasant.