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In the beginning of the memoir, Ishmael and his older brother Junior travel with their friends Gibrilla, Talloi, Kaloko, and Khalilou. The boys are together when the civil war reaches Mattru Jong; they love rap and hip-hop music. They struggle to hide from the rebels, find enough food to survive, and process the traumatic experiences they've had. They're split up after the attack at Kamator.

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Junior is Ishmael's older brother. He has 2 brothers, Ishmael and Ibrahim, and their parents are divorced. He wasn't always a bad kid until that happened. He is a great older brother towards Ishmael. He's kind, smart, and thoughtful and loves his brothers

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Ishmael Beah is the author, narrator, and protagonist of his memoir A Long Way Gone. He is a survivor of the Sierra Leone Civil War and he was a child soldier for several years during it; he was twelve years old when he first experienced the violence of war. Ishmael has two brothers, Junior and Ibrahim, and their parents are divorced; he loves his family very much. He enjoys rap and hip-hop music as well as reading. He is kindhearted, ambitious, determined, and smart.

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Gasemu is a man known for his single life and is known by Ishmael's mom(Ishmael's pops). Gasemu tells Ishmael and his friends that their families are in the next village.

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Esther is a black female nurse that's been checking up on Ishmael during the war. Shes been there for him trying to make him feel better about this whole war thing. She gave Ishmael an cassette tape.

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Quote''in the back of the van were 3 more dead bodies, 2 girls and 1 boy, their blood was all over the seats and on the roof of the van, i wanted to move away from what i was seeing but my body froze."-pg12-13

Paraphrase: 1-2 ishmael describes the 1st time he witnesses violence because of the war and he doesnt know how to react and process it.

Analysis: 3-4 this violent and disturbing imagery including ishmael's reaction to it, illustrates how suddenly violence and war can happen, which makes it diffucult to react in the moment. Ishmael is instantly tramatized and his reaction reflects how vulerable and innocent when he 1st experienced war. the sudden violence shocks the reader as well ishmael forcing the reader to visualize what ishmael saw and empezize with his stressful experience

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Quote: "I feel no physical pain, so I am not sure whether I've been wounded. I can feel the warmth of my AK-47's barrel on my back; I don't remember when I last fired it. It feels as if needles have been hammered into my brain and it is hard to be sure whether it is day or night." (page 18)

Paraphrase: Ishmael is struggling to think normally during his time in the war; it seems to be later into the war.

Analysis: Ishmael seems like he's been brainwashed or manipulated into behaving and thinking this way. He seems like he's separated himself from the reality of his situation; he's also struggling to tell the difference between what's real and what's not. This foreshadows what Ishmael will be like in the army and how violent he will have to become.

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Quote ''The moon wasnt in the sky, the air was stiff as if nature was scared itself was afraid of what was happening''(pg 22)

Paraphrase: Although everyone in the village was safe for now, everyone knew the rebels were coming.

Analysis: Ishmael personifies nature as being afraid in order to emphasize how much fear war causes and how it ruins everything it touches. He also describes Personification on how the birds and crickets sang in the evening before the sun went down but that particular night they didn't make a peep. He personifies this by saying not only the town was quiet, but nature itself was too.

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Quote: "We had made a logical decision and it had come to this. It was a typical aspect of being in the war. Things changed rapidly in a matter of second and no one had any control over anything." (page 29)

Paraphrase: Ishmael and his friends had walked miles and miles to get money to buy food, however, nobody in Mattru Jong was willing to sell food anymore.

Analysis: This helps to develop the theme that war causes things to "change rapidly in a matter of seconds" and things that usually make logical sense don't apply. Another example to prove this theme is when no one is selling or giving out food bc they want to store and savor it in case another tragic situation comes up. One more is how money became useless for the kids and all it took was a tragic invasion to change the value of everything around them.

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Quote: "Before the war a young man wouldn't have dared to talk to anyone older in such a rude manner. We grew up in a culture that demanded good behavior from everyone, and especially from the young. Young people were required to respect their elders and everyone in the community."  (page 33)

Paraphrase: Ishmael explains how, before the war started ruining everything, people in Sierra Leone were raised to respect their elders.

Analysis: This demonstrates the central character v.s. society conflict by emphasizing how the war has caused people who were raised to respect their elders to completely switch, becoming so cruel that they will make fun of and even torture an old man they don't even know.

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Quote: "The sad thing about all that hard labor was that, in the end, it all went to ruin, because the rebels did eventually come and everyone ran away, leaving their farms to be covered by weeds and devoured by animals." (page 43)

Paraphrase: In this village, Ishmael and his friends were lookouts at first, but then people assumed the rebels weren't coming so they started doing farm work, which was very difficult and painful. None of their hard work mattered at all; it was ruined as soon as the rebels eventually attacked the village.

Analysis: This part is ironic, specifically situational irony, because they hoped that working hard to grow food would help them survive but the farm is ruined before they get to benefit from their work at all; they probably wouldn't have worked that hard or maybe wouldn't even have worked in the fields at all if they knew what would happen.

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Quote: ''It is difficult to explain how it happened, but I mounted the coconut tree quite fast and unexpectedly.'' (page 47)

Paraphrase: Ishmael was never a climber until now even though he is tired, hungry and dehydrated; he didn't even realize what he was doing until after.

Analysis: This demonstrates the Character vs Nature conflict by showing how hunger, exhaustion, and dehydration caused Ishmael to be able to climb a coconut tree even though it should've been the opposite. Ishmael could not climb the coconut tree again even though it should've been easier after resting and eating. This shows the obvious towards the reader that he is struggling and is in survival mode, and is also saying he has more problems than to worry about the rebels. He has to find a way to survive while ducking and dogging the rebels.

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Quote: "Nothing happened after a couple of hours, so I decided to take a bath. I hadn’t had time to take one for a while. My clothes were dirty, my crapes were rotten, and my body was sticky with dirt. When I first threw water on my skin, it became slimy. There was no soap, but in the forest there was an area that had a particular kind of grass that could be used as a substitute. I had learned about this grass during one of the summers when I visited my grandmother. When I squeezed a bunch of the grasses together, they provided foam that left my body with a fresh scent. After I had finished taking a bath, I washed my clothes or, rather, soaked and spread them on the grass to dry. I sat naked, cleaning my teeth with sapwood.

Paraphrase: In this quote, Ishmael is explaining how it is to live in the jungle by himself with wild animals and how it feels to be dirty. He tells details like how slimy his skin was when he could finally get clean, how he had to brush his teeth with sticks.

Analysis: Ishmael describes his time being lost in the jungle, which demonstrates the character v.s. nature conflict that Ishmael has to struggle with on to or the water. Ishmael is lonely in a thick jungle, which the reader can infer because he only took a bath after hours of nothing happening. He explains how hard it is to live in the jungle with literally nothing he needs to take care of himself except some fruit to eat, but the part he struggles with the most isn't hunger, it's his loneliness and not knowing what's happened to his family.

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Quote: "I didn’t enjoy it, and for the first time I found myself thinking about the words of the song, closely listening to the subtle instruments in the beat. I had never done such a thing before, because I knew the words by heart and felt the beat. I didn’t feel it this time."

Paraphrase: His performance gets him out of death situations. He dances to rap, and hip hop music.

Analysis: Rap music symbolizes his innocence within his childhood. When he said he doesn't feel it anymore he is referring that he didn't feel his innocence anymore. However, he can't appreciate or enjoy his happier memories now because it just reminds him that he has no idea where his family is, if they're alive, or if his life will ever be okay again; he can't escape even when nothing bad is happening at that moment.

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Quote: "As I was thinking about these things, I fell out of the hammock. I was too lazy to get up, so I sat on the ground and thought about my two brothers, my father, mother, and grandmother. I wished to be with them. I put my hands behind my head and lay on my back, trying to hold on to the memories of my family. Their faces seemed to be far off somewhere in my mind, and to get to them I had to bring up painful memories. I longed for the gentle, dark, and shiny old hands of my grandmother; my mother’s tight enclosed embrace, during the times I visited her, as if hiding and protecting me from something; my father’s laughter when we played soccer together and when he sometimes chased me in the evening with a bowl of cold water to get me to take a shower; my older brother’s arms around me when we walked to school and when he sometimes elbowed me to stop me from saying things I would regret; and my little brother, who looked exactly like me and would sometimes tell people that his name was Ishmael when he did something wrong. I had trouble conjuring up these thoughts, and when I finally ventured into these memories, I became so sad that the bones in my body started to ache. I went to the river, dove into the water, and sat at the bottom, but my thoughts followed me.

Paraphrase: Ishmael thinks about his family a lot as he's wandering around trying to survive on his own. Although Ishmael is not yet to reunite with his family, memories of his family bring him strength.

Analysis: His being reunited with them is his biggest hope, it keeps him going and surviving for them. Once something comes in the way, it's tough for Ishmael to start hoping about anything else again to remember his purpose to keep going. His flashbacks cause pain and peace depending on what memory it is, but he keeps a high head and keeps moving for them; his new and painful memories are ruining his peaceful childhood memories, so his emotions keep going up and down.

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Quote: "The moon disappeared and took the stars with it, making the sky weep."

Paraphrase: The moon appeared but then it disappeared, meaning there was no hope in what he was doing. When they said the moon was weeping, they meant it wasn't there but it was still crying.

Analysis: The moon means hope. Whenever the moon is out Ishmael still has hope mostly into finding his family. When it disappears there is no hope in finding what he is looking for. The particular day the moon disappeared when Gasemu was falling towards his death, so that meant he was no longer going to live to help them find their families.

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Quote: " Visualize the enemy, the rebels who killed your parents, your family, and those who are responsible for everything that has happened to you."

Paraphrase: Corporal Gadafi repeated this quote to make the boys more aggressive and to never think twice about killing.

Analysis: The boys were still new to training they weren't able to get used to it because they were still innocent. Corporal needed a way to make them man up and get the job done so he used the best way which was to use something they cared about the most. He had no choice but to use their family and those who were responsible for the war. After this the boys became aggressive and their innocence slowly was fading away.

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Quote: "My nickname was 'Green Snake' because I would situate myself in the most advantageous and sneaky position and would take out a whole village from under the tiniest shrub without being noticed. The lieutenant gave me the name. He said, You don't look dangerous, but you are, and you blend in with nature like a green snake, deceptive and deadly when you want to be.''