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Title: A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier
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Manufacturer: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
List Price: $22.00
Our Price: $7.99
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| Customer Reviews: |
| A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier by Farrar, Straus and Giroux A Long Way Gone |
| This book tells a story that the world has not heard about the life of a child soldier. Some of it is shocking to say the least, but it needs to be read and understood. Get a box of tissues and settle in on a wet day. |
| A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier by Farrar, Straus and Giroux We are Sheltered |
| We are so sheltered in the US -- it's amazing what this young man had to endure and that he was able to rise above all the horrible things and really make something of his life. |
| A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier by Farrar, Straus and Giroux too matter of fact? |
When reading this book, one must keep some distance between oneself and the narrative, to not be overwhelmed by the horrors that are described. Fortunately, the writing style helps the reader maintain this distance. Writing in a very matter of fact style, perhaps even too matter of factly, Beah describes his efforts to avoid getting pulled into the civil war in Sierra Leone and his actions when he is eventually "recruited" to join the army.
The bulk of this book is quite bleak, by necessity. But Beah shows a talent for story-telling throughout, especially in the more hopeful sections of the book, when he describes his life before the civil war struck his village and after his "rehabilitation". |
| A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier by Farrar, Straus and Giroux Should be required reading |
| This book was an eye opening dipiction of the life of a child soldier in Sierra Leone. Beah's novel shows the journey that this young man took from being forced to fight in a war that robbed him of his innocence to his ultimate rehabilitation. It is a must read and should be required reading for high school students. |
| A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier by Farrar, Straus and Giroux A Reality Check on one's worldview |
| A Long Way Gone is one of the few books I have read in one sitting. This memoir is a glimpse of what is happening under our noses in the world during the last decade. Too often isolated from unreported terrors and the horrors of civil war, Beah tells a frightful first hand account of a life filled with desparation brought on by the will to just survive. The book erases any illusions that children of war torn regions live with the security found in the west. While not explicitly stated, the book in the end is a reality check on one's worldview. |
| A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier by Farrar, Straus and Giroux Product Description |
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. |
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