A Long Way Gone

Critics

• Slaughter of innocence

  A Long Way Gone by Ishmael Beah 240pp, Fourth Estate, £14.99 As the media grows increasingly concerned with our private lives, and individuals in the west have come to understand that the quickest route to fame is to shamelessly reveal all, the art o ... (read full critics)

  guardian.co.uk published on Sat, 25 Sep 2010

• Boy killer's astonishing confession

  A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier by Ishmael Beah Fourth Estate £14.99, pp229 This is a classic story of descent from shining-faced innocence into extreme turpitude and thence to redemption through love. Unlike most such stories, this one hap ... (read full critics)

  guardian.co.uk published on Sat, 25 Sep 2010

7 Reviews

• 2 people find this helpful

  

  An interesting memoir -- author was a boy soldier (15 yo) in Sierra Leone and book details his experiences. Eyeopening re: evolution of a civil strife into civil war and devolution of a country. Begins with very brief look at village life before it is torn apart by war. After rebel soldiers come ... (continue)

  An interesting memoir -- author was a boy soldier (15 yo) in Sierra Leone and book details his experiences. Eyeopening re: evolution of a civil strife into civil war and devolution of a country. Begins with very brief look at village life before it is torn apart by war. After rebel soldiers come to the village, villagers are scattered in their efforts to escape and author begins journey through the jungle, first in effort to escape the fighting and find his family and then as a child soldier. Although there is much on the psychological changes the author goes through as he experiences increasing exposure to war and violence, culminating in becoming the person who inflicts the violence, and then eventually reforms, I got the feeling that much was missing from the narrative. Adding to this feeling was the sense that either the author was not that skilled at portraying his feelings or that he was choosing to leave a lot out.

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  beth said on Jul 9, 2007 about the Hardcover edition | Add your feedback

• 

  deeply heavy, but inspiring.
  it's the world we're all living in, in a different way. it's told really like a fiction, as it's so hard to believe and especially you know this is no history for Africa, this is on-going for many countries in the world.
  a must-read, for getting to know the world, for ... (continue)

  deeply heavy, but inspiring.
  it's the world we're all living in, in a different way. it's told really like a fiction, as it's so hard to believe and especially you know this is no history for Africa, this is on-going for many countries in the world.
  a must-read, for getting to know the world, for the betterment of the world.

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  Clio said on Jun 1, 2010 | Add your feedback

• 

  Very insightful! A great read for veterans. Makes you thankful you can come home to a safe country when your tour is over. A good reminder of how lucky we are to have the government we do and people who are passionate about keeping it together even when they disagree with it.

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  JonnieBean said on Jan 16, 2009 | Add your feedback

• 

  I loved this terrible story that opened my eyes on yet another victim of war, a former child soldier telling his survival story to the world.

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  Benedetta said on Sep 5, 2008 about the Hardcover edition | Add your feedback

• 

  a boy soldier tell his true story. definitely shock you. an unbelievable childhood.
  a true story that would make everyone to notice the problem happening in Africa.

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  Jas said on Jun 20, 2008 about the Hardcover edition | Add your feedback

• 

  I can't put it down. The first two pages have already captured my attention.

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  Gobs Chan said on May 24, 2008 about the Hardcover edition | Add your feedback

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Book Details

• Rating:
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• English Books
• Paperback
• ISBN-10: 0007262523
• ISBN-13: 9780007262526
• Publisher: HarperPerennial
• Pub date: Apr 01, 2007
• Also available as: Hardcover and Others
• In other languages: other languages 繁體書

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