A LONG WAY GONE: Memoirs of a boy soldier – Novel, by Ishmael Beah

In “A Long Way Gone”, Beah, tells a riveting story: how at the age of twelve, he fled attacking rebels and wandered a land rendered unrecognizable by violence. Children have become soldiers of choice. In the more than fifty conflicts going on worldwide, it is estimated that there are some 300,000 childsoldiers. Ishmael Beah used to be one of them. 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. “By thirteen, he’d been picked up by the government army”. 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.

http://www.amazon.com/Long-Way-Gone-Memoirs-Soldier/dp/0374531269