The Unemployed Writer

So, I started writing a post about how much I respect a guy named Ishmael Beah, a man who wrote a book about being a child soldier in Sierra Leone and the rehabilitation process from being enmeched in a war at such a young age. Then my computer crashed. It crashed hard. Monumentall hard. So, I have to copy what I could remember and start over. It loses some of the gravitas of the original post. But, I will repeat (for myself at least) that there are very few writers I have any respect for whose work I’ve never read, almost none that are alive today.

Ishamel Beah first appeared as a mention on Janice Haryada’s One Minute Book Reviews. Mentioning his book as the new Starbuck’s choice to sell in their stores (ousting the horrendous new book by Mitch Albom) and showing off an essay he wrote while attending the United Nations International SChool in New York, she brought my attention to his book being released in March.

Later in February, I saw Beah on The Daily Show in a rare display of solemn chat with Jon Stewart, free of jokes and asides, a candid conversation about an incredible story as told in Beah’s upcoming book, a long way gone. Flash forward another month or two and I still haven’t read the book, but I’ve seen it everywhere and as one of the bestselling books in every bookstore I visit, I’ve been massively tempted to pick it up, but just hadn’t gotten around to it quite yet.

Luckily for me, I waited because on Monday, Ishmael Beah made an appearance at the University Bookstore here in Seattle and read from a long way gone and signed copies for everyone. Before I tout how happy I was to have met the man and shaken his hand, let me say that this is a vastly important book, regardless of the hype or import grafted to it by the media, Beah does something very special in these pages.

He’s an incredible writer with a story very few will ever be able to tell and fewer still as fully as him. He was intelligent, humble, and visible troubled with the recount, even now after having written an entire book and talked about it for months. More than 10 years he’s been free of that lifestyle, but the pain of it still sits at the surface and his willingness to speak openly about everything he’s been through was captivating. Granted, he was also a very quiet man, and so hearing his words was a task of its own. The top floor of the bookstore was more than full, overfilling to the stair welds and adjacent departments, and such a quiet man’s voice just didn’t carry with the force needed to reach the back rows.

But, meeting the man, visibly tired and worn by the night’s activities was still quite a turn. He was kind, shook my hand and answered my questions about his stay in Seattle (a bit too cold for his tastes) and I left feeling as though I’d met someone who will be an important world leader one day, a speaker of international importance. This isn’t a review of his book or anything, nor commentary on his message. I’m just happy to have heard him speak and hope that others might find his book and read it themselves.