So The Path Does Not Die, 2012, Pede Hollist ****

Fina is snatched away by her father from the middle of an initiation rituals that her grand mother has prepared for her in the forrest. Following that, she left her village to the city with her parents and little sister. Life in the city is not as promised, she loses her father and is forced to leave the country for the U.S.A. Life in  America is not as expected either, however, there are opportunities so she grabs them.

Nevertheless, she still does not feel she belongs, somehow in many ways her past continues to haunt her, she feels that there is a circle in her past life in Sierra Leone that is not yet closed. However, how does she return back home if her country is in the throes of a civil war and all her family members are dead or displaced.

Will this feeling of not belonging let her lead a peaceful and fulfilling life in

Holding Demons in Small Jars, 2016, Jasmine Kumalah ****

Holding Demons in Small Jar is an intense short narrative tale that asks the following questions: what happens to child-soldiers once the war is over and done with? How do they coexist in a society with people whose women and children they have raped and maimed? People whose houses they have burnt to ashes? Can their path and destiny be redirected? How does society deal with a situation like this?

"The Minister of Justice didn’t care about these war boys. They had been useful during the troubles, but now the war was over. Everyone knew it wasn’t only the rebels who used boy soldiers. In the midst of the war the desperate government turned its eye away from the colonels who recruited young boys in the name of saving the country"

Detective Alu has to investigate the murder of

Allah Is Not Obliged, 2007, Ahmadou Kourouma ****

Allah Is Not Obliged (to be fair about all the things he does here on earth) is a novel that I surprisingly enjoyed. Keeping in mind it is a translation, coupled with the fact that I couldn't bring myself to finish reading the author's other book "Waiting for the Wild Beast to Vote". That said, let me also confess that the beginning of the book was somewhat tedious, the narrator's style was annoying but I gradually got use to him, a ten year old orphan turned child soldier.

Birahima the orphan, lost his mother and went in search of his aunt who lives in a war ravaged Liberia, along with a family friend turned "Sorcerer". As expected, during their journey they ran into various guerrilla fighters and had to join them to survive, or else die.

In my opinion this book sort of cast light on the unrestrained use of child soldiers in the civil war that caused extensive damage to the people of Liberia and Sierra Leone. The only difference being that it is disturbingly narrated through the voice of a child in a "matter of fact" way.

I have as well read about the

The Memory of Love, 2010, by Aminatta Forna ***

I finished reading this book May 23rd 2012 to be precise. I liked it. As I said earlier in My Authors and their books I hold  Aminatta Forna (British; Sierra Leonean and Scottish heritage). The Memory of Love 2010 awarded the Commonwealth Prize for Best Book in 2011, shortlisted for the Orange Prize for Fiction in the same year. Shortlisted for the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award, with the winner to be announced in June 2012.

This book deserves all the awards, Aminatta Forna has got an innate talent to put words together and to tell stories, what a matured mind. She is naturally good. I admire her. There is nothing ordinary in this work.

However, I did not enjoy the novel, I find it difficult to go through, I had to go through 150 pages before I could start to understand. Aminatta's writings sometimes I found tedious. This is not an easy read, and it is a 500+ pages, this is a book for the matured in mind, not every body could sink into this novel.

The story line is really very beautiful, this is the second book about Sierra Leon I've read so far. It tells  (mostly) the story of a group of people (University teachers, doctor...) how they lived and loved before the war in an independent (corrupt) Sierra Leon, How the war changed them and the consequences of the change after the war. The story line is fantastic. The way it was written I consider too sophisticated.

I recommend this book to the matured in mind.

Please click here to read review in Spanish.

A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier, 2007, Ishmael Beah *****

I read this book April 2012, I loved it and it is my favourite. This novel was a gift. What a book? My heart beat accelerated while I read it.

Ishamael Beah perfectly, simply and easily wrote a very difficult book, a story, uneasy and overwhelming. He is a story teller indeed. An easy, clear and very understandable read. 5 stars book for sure.

How can one go through such terrible experiences even as a child? How can we be able to sleep if atrocities like this happens in some other part of the world in which we exist?

I couldn't keep this book down, it tormented me even when I finished it. God knows, Ishmael Beah is one of the people that inspires me.

Sierra Leon, what a beautiful country, the way nature was described in this book reminds me of paradise. Its richness in animals, trees, streams, rivers.... It is amazing.

I heard about the war sometime in the past, sometimes I saw documentaries, I heard about it, but I had no idea it was as brutal as it was described in this book. This is a first hand story from a young fellow who has lived and survived the war. Fortunately for me, I lived war through this book and now, I get to appreciate my life more. There is nothing good war brings, if not to destroys.

I highly recommend. As I earlier said, Ishmael Beah is my inspirational person. Laura Simms (His mother) I can't stop loving and admiring.