Well, in this first section I was easily caught up in what was going on. At the start of the second chapter, the main character Ishmael Beah is killing people wit his AK-47: "I am pushing a rusty wheelbarrow in a town where the air smells of blood and burnt flesh" (18). Ishmael Beah along with his brother, Junior, and his friends, Talloi, Gibrilla, Kaloko, and Khalilou are on their way to Mattru Jong for a talent show where they are going to show off their rapping skillz, only to find out that rebels have been killing and destroying entire villages. So far I have no comprehension of how any human being could do these attrocities but I will soon find out. The children don't think that the civil war will go on for long, give or take a few months...but could this just be their re-assurance and hopefulness that nothing bad will arise? I find this quote particularlly disturbing: "One bullet has crushed his Adam's apple and sent the remains of it to the back of his throat. I lift the cloth from the body's face. I am looking at my own" (19). What will eventually happen to Ishmael? As of now I am posed on the theory that he will become a child soldier under the RUF and eventually hurt people that he loves...but that will come further into the book.
PS-This is Luke's post...I tried logging on but I couldn't post unless i was in the master blog thingy...so i logged into Nikki's because i remembered the password...so this is Luke...mmk.
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5 comments:
This book gets to the point quickly and picks up quick. Ishmael Beah is very discriptive in what he sees after the rebles come into a village. "I became afraid, since I could no longer tell the difference between dream and reality" (15). Ishmael Beah has a lot of dreams and all that he has wrote about so far are very bloody and not too plesant. Imagining running for your life at the age of 12 is unbelievable and it is really very sad. Honestly I might cry reading this book... =(
So far I do like this book but it is so hard to believe that Ishmael Beah acctually went through all this and all of it is in his memory.
So far I'm really liking this book. It's really sad but really good. I'd have to agree with luke that Ishmael will become a child soldier. What happened to the rest of Ishmael's family (mother, father, and little brother)? I'm guessing they died and that maybe a return to the village will show what happened. When I'm reading this it's hard to imagine that someone actually had to live through it. "The boy wo caused the rebels to spot us didn't make it to the first crowded village we reached" (28-9). I think I'm really going to like this book. What does everyone else thing so far?
-Note- This is Tim, I got an error logging in, and had to create a new account, so I gave it a more appropriate name. As for more proof of this, it somehow split my comment into two posts, and I had to delete them and repost...
It's a good book so far, though it's still hard to imagine that this is actualy happening as we speak. The main question I have about this book is where the U.N. is during this entire mess. Are the U.S. and British to proud to help clean up the mess that they caused. It realy makes me angry thinking about how we have had a hand in Africas unstatability right now...
As for how I think it will turn out, I definetly agree that Ishmael will become a child soldier, and we know for a fact that he survives. What im wondering about is how he's going to describe the experience as he's slowly brainwashed. It's obviouse that the rebels are in some kind crazy state, some of the acts they commit are horrible: "...lay the bodies of two men whose genitals, limb, and had been chopped off by a machete that was on the ground next to thier piled body parts." (27)
The the rebels actualy think they are helping the country? I still can not bieleve that all of this stuff is going on. To me this sounds like a better reason to move into a country than that of the reasons the U.S. has for other countries.
Sorry for the late comment, but I didnt get home until today. The weather was bad so we figured we would just skip stopping at our house on Sunday and just move on to where we were heading for Christmas. I didnt post my comment for the other chapters since this is 1-4ish. I'll wait untill Nikki posts the 5-8ish thread i guess.
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