Brooklyn Shirah District Summer Reading Assignment 8.4.2017 Part 1 My book was A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier by Ishmael Beah. This book is a nonfiction memoir that was a #1 National Bestseller. This book was truly amazing and opened my eyes. It tells the story of a boy named Ishmael that grew up in Sierra Leone, in the middle of a horrible civil war. After finishing a fun talent show involved with dancing, rapping, and laughter, Ishmael and his friends start to head back but soon realize that something horrible has happened. The village was attacked and their families and homes were gone. The boys then run to different villages to try not to be captured and be killed or turned into monsters. The boys eventually made it to a village …show more content…
They continue on their journey hoping to find their families. During their journey, many people they had become close to died in front of them, the boys were scarred after this. They eventually found some salvation for a while in a village that was protected by government soldiers. After some time, many soldiers are dead so they have to recruit. Ishmael and his friends are recruited and are taught how to be killing machines. Ishmael starts to enjoys his life; he is getting to kill rebels, getting thanks from civilians, and is getting to do a lot of drugs. Ishmael fought for over 2 years until UNICEF came to their village and took Ishmael, along with some other boys to a rehabilitation center. Everyday was a battle to say the least, the boys experienced drug withdrawal and a huge amount of anger. After some months, Ishmael started to become close to Esther, a nurse that treated him earlier. She listened to Ishmael and treated him like a son. He soon found out that he had an uncle that lived in Freetown in Sierra Leone that he went to live with. He is there for a while, very happy, when he gets a call about going to New York City to speak to the UN about child soldiers. He travels to NYC, applies, and they selected him to tell his story. Soon after …show more content…
If Ishmael would have gave up, he most likely would have died a very long time ago. “We had walked six miles and were now in Kabati, Grandmother’s village.” (Beah, Pg. 12). If the boys would have stopped moving, the rebel groups most likely would have found them and captured them or killed them. Therefore, the boys kept moving. “I couldn’t cry as much as I wanted to.” (Beah, Pg. 99). From constantly running and traveling without much food or water, many of the boys were struggling to survive. When one of the boys died, Ishmael said that line. If any of the boys would stopped running and just broke down, they would be dead so some of them became numb to the pain, especially Ishmael. “I was always losing everything that meant something to me.” (Beah, Pg. 208). The war and the violence destroyed so many children and people like Ishmael. When his uncle died, he said this, and then left. Ishmael did not have time to mourn his uncle because he had to get away before he was sucked back into the war or end up dead. He was determined to never let that