Title: A Long Way Gone
Description: A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier (2007) is a memoir written by Ishmael Beah, an author from Sierra Leone. The book is a firsthand account of Beah's time as a child soldier during the civil war in Sierra Leone (1990s). Beah was 12 years old when he fled his village after it was attacked by rebels, and he wandered the war-filled country until brainwashed by an army unit that forced him to use guns and drugs. By 13, he had perpetrated and witnessed numerous acts of violence. Three years later, UNICEF rescued him from the unit and put him into a rehabilitation program that helped him find his uncle, who would eventually adopt him. After his return to civilian life he began traveling the United States recounting his story.

A Long Way Gone was nominated for a Quill Award in the Best Debut Author category for 2007.

Time magazine's Lev Grossman named it one of the Top 10 Nonfiction Books of 2007, ranking it at No. 3, and praising it as "painfully sharp", and its ability to take "readers behind the dead eyes of the child-soldier in a way no other writer has."

A Long Way Gone was listed as one of the top ten books for young adults by the American Library Association in 2008.
Subjects: United Nations, Africa, biography, Africa, history, Africa, juvenile literature, Africa, west, history, Barnsoldater, Biographies, Biography, Boy soldiers, Children, Child soldiers, Civil war, Historia, History, Inbördeskriget i Sierra Leone 1991-2002, Juvenile, Juvenile Military participation, Juvenile Participation, Kind, Large type books, Military participation, New York Times bestseller, New York Times reviewed, nyt:paperback_nonfiction=2010-10-30, Personal narratives, Reading Level-Grade 10, Reading Level-Grade 11, Reading Level-Grade 12, Social conditions, Soldat, Soldiers, UNICEF, Walkman, cassettes, rap music, Sierra Leone Armed Forces, prisoners of war, cannabis, drug withdrawl, storytellers, Kindsoldaten, 89.76 polemology, Sierra leone, Civil war (sierra leone : 1991-2002) fast (ocolc)fst01721073
Places: Sierra Leone, Freetown, United States, Kamator, Mattru Jong, Mogbwemo, New York City, Guinea
People: Ishmael Beah (1980-), Ishmael Beah, Junior Beah, Alhaji, Kanei, Musa, Saidu, Jumah, Moriba, Talloi, Gibrilla, Kaloko, Khalilou, Uncle Tommy, Esther, Mambu, Mohamed, Run-DMC, Bob Marley, Gasemu
Time periods: 1991-2002, 1961, 1996