Ishmael Beah

Sierra Leonean-American author — former child soldier — author of A Long Way Gone (memoir) and Radiance of Tomorrow — whose memoir of being a child soldier in Sierra Leone is the most widely read firsthand account of child soldiers.

Creates the definitive child soldier memoir — A Long Way Gone is the first widely read firsthand account of being a child soldier, making the phenomenon legible to Western audiences and transforming international understanding of Sierra Leone's civil war.