Review: a long way gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier [kris]

The dark browns and deep greens of the forest peel away from the road as the beams of my headlights stretch forward into bluish darkness. There are no streetlights. The road and forest are much darker than I’m used to. I’m used to cities where artificial light is always present. My sunroof is open and the moonlight literally pours over me. I’ve never seen anything like it. I glance down at my arms and the tops of my legs, illuminated by the warmth of the moon. I’ve never seen the moon this bright. I’ve already been crying but now the tears are coming freely from a deeper place in my chest. I have a familiar sense of my Father speaking to me. There is no exchange of words. He is near me. With no other cars in sight I slow down and stare. A warm globe of bright yellow and white lightens me in its presence, regardless of the deep pull of a violet and navy night sky around it. The moon’s glow even seems to draw warmer colors from beneath the blues and purples. If I look closely enough into the sky I can feel bold reds and magenta pressing through the darkness.

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I read a book this week that has de-railed my writing projects.

Last Wednesday I was grazing the book section at Target in an upscale Brentwood shopping center waiting for my Mom who was looking at party favors in another section of the store. Not looking for anything in particular, I scanned the back covers of several marked-down books: Eat Pray Love, Twilight, something new by Candace Bushnell, the third installment in Gregory Maguire’s Wicked series, and then my gaze rested upon a book cover with a young boy dressed in a bright red tee shirt and navy shorts, a gun slung across his chest. a long way gone. Immediately I grabbed it off the shelf and began to read the back cover. “Child soldier Ishmael Beah tells his story in his own words…” I bought it. $11.93. Ishmael waited patiently on my nightstand for two long days of work, small group, the gym, and a pre-scheduled lunch with friends—his presence never going unnoticed. At 5pm on Friday night I finally made the time to sit down and read, broke to text Jeni and cancel our plans at 7, and read the last page around 11:30.

There isn’t much to say about the book, only because Ishmael’s story stands so powerfully on its own. There is an advertising quote on the front cover from the Washington Post. The quote is actually true for once, “Everyone in the world should read this book . . . We should read it to learn about the world and about what it means to be human.” I received Ishmael’s story, and cried deeply as I listened to his telling of the pain and darkness he experienced and was part of. A son of God’s and a brother of mine, completely ravaged by evil and made an active part of the devouring.

A theme from Ishmael’s memoir that my spirit deeply connected to is the significance of the moon. I’ve had a fascination with the moon since I was a kid. And have often wondered about what God wanted to tell us through it. In Ishmael’s village the moon is a symbol of hope and wisdom. Through Ishmael’s story I’ve come to think that what God is showing us in the moon is presence. Atrocities like Ishmael’s experience as a child soldier show us the extent of the darkness that has enveloped the land. In the darkness of night the sun’s light is gone. All of its warmth and glory has left us as we are, and retreated beyond the horizon, out of our reach. We are helpless to bring it back. As Micah tells the prophets “Now the night will close around you, cutting off all your visions. Darkness will cover you, putting an end to your predictions. The sun will set for you . . . your day will come to an end”(3:6-7). But even in this darkness the moon is present. Its presence is different than the sun’s. The moon demands nothing. It is patient in the sky. The moon waits in darkness with us. It is a different kind of light. A reflection, an image of something we cannot see but, by hope and faith, believe is coming. All encompassing light is coming, light that chases away all trace of darkness. In the sky’s story this hope is realized every morning. This daily rhythm is a picture of the larger story that we hope in. That our Father will come for us. For Ishmael and for me. Our Father will return and restore His light in our land. And the moon that we all share is our symbol of this hope and promise.