A Long Way Gone is about a young boy that faces extreme conditions, but fights for his life as everything he knows slowly fades away. When Ishmael was the age of 13, his village was attached by rebels. He and some of his friends escape, and manage to scout around the villages for food and water before the army finds him. They make him think that every rebel death is avenging his family. Ishmael and his friends become addicted to drugs, and they use them to express their emotions to get through the time they are in. Ishmael is then turned over to UNICEF to help imagine a future, and forget the past. I believe that the author's purpose of the book was to help people understand what is happening around the world, and what we can do to stop
