Radiance of Tomorrow: A Novel

Any one who has read Ishmael Beah's heartbreaking memoir A Long Way Gonecan attest to the fact that he is a compelling author. Having read his memoir, I had a great curiosity about his recently published novel about Sierra Leone. I wondered what kind of novelist he would be and now that I know I hope he continues writing both fiction and nonfiction as he has a gift. In the Author's Note he explains the great tradition of storytelling in his native country and that his mother tongue Mende has a poetic way of speaking both of which he hopes to use in Radiance of Tomorrow: Mende, is very expressive, very figurative, and when I write, I always struggle to find the English equivalent of things that I really want to say in Mende. For example, in Mende, you wouldn't say "night came suddenly"; you would say "the sky rolled over and changed its sides." Beah is successful in his use of both the story telling techniques and his use of language it does in fact lull the reader, letting one forget the horrors of war and look for the radiance of tomorrow. This is a story of a people returning to their village and rebuilding, attempting to leave behind the sorrows and reclaim their home. The first to return to the village of Imepri are the elders, Mama Kadie and Pa Moiwa. The book begins: "She was the first to arrive where it seemed the wind no longer exhaled. Several miles from town, the trees had entangled one another. Their branches grew toward the ground, burying the leaves in the soil to blind their eyes so the sun would not promise them tomorrow with its rays. It was only the path that was reluctant to cloak its surface completely with grasses, as though it anticipated it would soon end its starvation for the warmth of bare feet that gave it life. The long and winding paths were spoken of as "snakes" that one walked upon to encounter life or to arrive at the places where life lived. Like snakes, the paths were now ready to shed their old skins for new ones, and such occurrences take time with the necessary interruptions. Today, her feet began one of those interruptions. It may be that those whose years have many seasons are always the first to rekindle their broken friendship with the land, or it may just have happened this way." I wanted so much for the sorrows that I read of to be over. During the first third of the book, I found myself sobbing and yet so respectful of the spirit of these people who held so true to their essence through such difficult times, who revered their elders and look to them for guidance, who remained strangely quiet regarding the horrors of war to their children who were too young to know. This time though the danger comes not from war but from a corporation involved in rutile mining, which is indeed a growing industry in Sierra Leone. We see the ways in which this corporation attacks the life and culture that the people of Imperi have so carefully rebuilt: "The elders shake their heads with doubt, they knew they had to try, as there was more at stake than tradition. Tradition can live on only if those carrying it respect it--and live in conditions that allow the traditions to survive. Otherwise, traditions have a way of hiding inside people and leaving only dangerous footprints of confusion." The story is both compelling and worrisome. It is not for someone who needs all the strings neatly tied and of course they are not neatly tied in Sierra Leone. I cannot help but admire Beah's skill as an author and sincerely hope to be reading more from him.

There is something familiar on every page of this book if you've lived through the "struggle for freedom". Although the story is a narration of the conditions in Sierra Leone, it could very well have been the story of Rwanda, South Africa or most any of the previously war thorn ravaged and colonised countries on the African Continent. The story begins with the author expressing the need for the oral traditional storytelling of life, in especially the aftermath of a war thorn place, the author says "I BRING A LOT OF THAT ORAL TRADITION TO MY WRITING, AND I TRY TO LET IT SEEP INTO THE WORDS. THE PLACES I COME FROM HAVE SUCH RICH LANGUAGES, SUCH A VARIETY OF EXPRESSION. IN SIERRA LEONE WE HAVE ABOUT FIFTEEN LANGUAGES AND THREE DIALECTS." The author further emphasises the use of language and the use of it in expressing self. "FOR EXAMPLE, IN MENDE, YOU WOULDN'T SAY "NIGHT CAME SUDDENLY", YOU WOULD SAY "THE SKY ROLLED OVER AND CHANGED ITS SIDES". This is evident throughout the book, where the expression of the people is expressed to the reader to embrace the realness and trueness of the moment. He further says "There's a saying in oral tradition of storytelling that when you tell a story, when you give out a story, it is no longer yours, it belongs to everyone who encounters it and everyone who takes it in. You are only the SHEPHERD of that story - it's coming from you - and you can guide it in any way, ...." The story opens at the end of a vicious war which through the storytelling of this book, reveals the suffering, cruelty, senselessness of war and the human strength determined to persevere and survive. The elderly returns home to their village - beaten and savagely tortured by the war - they return to complete this senseless act of war by gathering the bones and maimed bodies of those who had been slaughtered. The act of "cleaning" up in itself is like a therapeutic bandage to the furious wound of pain for these characters Kadie and Moiwa. As the story unfolds, many more begin to this place they once called home - Imperi. Everyone who returns holds within themselves quiet painful and torturous stories. Some of the torture is evident on their physical forms where amputations have taken place, as is the story of Sila and his two children, their arms severed by a child soldier committing this act for the sake of survival. Sila's character and his outlook on his life experiences, with very little prospects of finding gainful employment or a way to with ease support his children is another illustration of the optimistic tone the author writes about. He exudes positive and faith filled energy. The only area of his difficulty in reconciling with the pain of the past is having to daily live in a village where the child who performed the act of amputation on him and his children. The child soldier and the house where the "orphans" live is lead by the character Colonel. The years of the war has taught him discipline, determination and the stoic ability to endure all lives pains without revealing his feelings to anyone, but alas....it has robbed him and children like him of their childhood. These children have long ago stopped day dreaming, fantasising, as their realities have exposed them to harshness which most adults never get to experience in a life time. Bockarie is the character most likely to resemble the African family we have been privy to in the oral tradition of storytelling, the story of a wife, a husband, children and a grandfather who live every day to bring joy to themselves and others. Bockarie is a teacher and the story continues with his life journey and those of his families. The village rebuilds life over the next weeks, and the people of Imperi begin to settle into old familiar ways of living, sharing food, stories and dreams, when their every-day village lives is disturbed by the emergence of a Mining Company unsettles all that they've built over the months after the war. The mining company focussed on gaining maximum capital from its operations, represents the birth of a great change to the people of Imperi. Most of the change is detrimental for their way of live, children are electrocuted, workers from the village are exploited and at times even those who die under the unsafe and dangerous conditions of the mining are not given traditional and proper burials, women are at risk as the violence and rape of young girls escalates. The story sadly results in a new form of struggle and suffering, and as the stories within the story unveils the systematic demise of a way of life, the author persists even then in his message of hope and optimism. At a pivotal time when the collaborate decision making of the village will determine the joint and individual choices of the villagers the same elder Kadie addresses the people "We used to sit around in a circle to tell many stories. Nowadays in our cities, when we manage to have them, there are mostly elders and adults. There aren't many children to receive the stories. We, the elders, our hearts cry, because we worry that we may lose our connection to the different moons to come, to the moons that have passed, and to the sun today. The sun will set without our whispers. The ears and voices of those gone will be closed to us. Our grandchildren will have weak backbones and they won't have the ears to understand the knowledge that lies within them, that holds them firm on this earth. A simple wind of despair will easily break them. What must we do, my friends" - "We must live in the RADIANCE OF TOMORROW, as our ancestors have suggested in their tales. For what is yet to come tomorrow has possibilities, and we must think of it, the simples glimpse of that possibility of goodness. That will be our strength. That has always been our strength.".

This entrancing story is told in the fashion of Sierra Leone, the author's home. He has explained that he often uses the more lyrical names for objects which are found in his home. The language is gorgeous and the pace of the prose is lovely. This story starts with Mama Kadie as she arrives at her home Imperi. Imperi had been destroyed seven years before by the rebels in an action of "No Living Thing." The buildings are burned and bones letter the ground but Kadie had been unable to be happy in any other place. As survivors stagger in, Imperi comes to life for a brief shining time as the old ways are resurrected. Included in the returned is a band of former child soldiers. These wounded beings seek redemption from the horror they were forced to create. Benjamin and Bockarie are two young men with families and the discourse soon follows their struggle to provide an honorable life for their families. The village slowly blooms and traditions live anew. After the beauty of the newly reborn village, one can barely endure the devastation that is written when the mining company comes with the outsider search for resources to take away. It takes all the skill of this impressive new author to bring this story forward without the ruination of the reader and all of his characters. His closing story entails two brothers who had set off forgetting their hearts. Upon retrieving them and cleansing them, "they could no longer experience things the way they had." Such is the fate of the reader, which is how it should be. One must brave the stories brought through the soles of one's feet while on the path. While pain is a part of the experience of reading this book, the story is one that must be told.

Beah's fictional work is briefly entertaining, but lacks the depth and quality of an experienced author. His language style makes the book interesting, but there is a clear difference between this book and Beah's memoir A Long Way Gone.

Ishmael Beah tells the stories of people returning to reoccupy Imperi, a village in rural Sierra Leone, after a cruel and disruptive war. First to come are two elders, who gather the bones of those massacred during the war; then some adults seeking the remains of families and lives they had lost; then children, some pregnant, some homeless, some ex-child soldiers, with no place else to go. The townspeople try to restablish their connection with their history and culture, among other ways, through storytelling. But the war has brought an every man for himself ethic into the collective life of the village. And to the town's misfortune, a mining company has come to exploit deposits of rutile, and before long the three things needed for a village -- a source of water, farmland and a cemetary -- have all been despoiled and the culture of the town overwhelmed by the demands of the mining company. The village is relocated and the families disperse. We follow one family to the capital city, where everyone has to hustle to survive and the big men's hustle is the country, its government and wealth. We learn about the 0-0-1 meal plan (an evening meal only). Throughout the family tries to maintain its morals and good behavior and love for education, even though these traits no longer contribute to survival or enrichment as once they did. The people and the country exist on the hope, frequently exhausted, for the radiance of tomorrow. Having spent some time in western Africa, the scenes are very familiar -- the countryside torn up at will by the mining companies, the parents struggling to pay their childrens' school fees, what passes for transport on what passes for roads, the welcome of a meal of cassava or rice with soup (sauce), the contrast between people looking out for themselves and people wanting to see their country modern and honest and communitarian. Ishmael Beah tells the stories of these people and this country in the tones of his native language, with full understanding of the cultural rifts brought by war and materialism. Through it all, hope for and trust in the radiance of tomorrow carries us through the painful, unspeakable moments. A thrilling book.

A beautifully written book dealing primarily with the aftermath of the civil war in Sierra Leone and all of its horrors. The survivors of the killings come out of hiding and try to reestablish their home town and their local culture only to find that while the war may be over, its effects will go on and life will never truely be the same again. However, life also goes on and these good people will find a way to persevere. The initial scenes with the survivors, coming out of the forest and many of them scarred and maimed, trying to find out who survived and who didn't while trying to make sense of their current reality is emotionally overwhelming. So much goes wrong for the various characters you come to be emotionally invested in, but in the end, the novel is surprisingly positive. Well worth reading. .

As the families in this novel continue down the road of increasing difficulties and threats to their existence, a village elder makes the following observation: "“We must live in the radiance of tomorrow, as our ancestors have suggested in their tales. For what is yet to come tomorrow has possibilities, and we must think of it, the simplest glimpse of that possibility of goodness. That will be our strength. That has always been our strength." That they persevere despite having been in the war and now being overwhelmed by the destructive forces of mining and graft is a testament to their strength. Mr Beah uses the phrases of his childhood to bring to life the nature of the people and their land. I found it difficult to read the book because of the incredible threats they faced. The beauty of his writing helped overcome the near grief I felt for them. This book should be mandatory reading for anyone supporting war and/or unregulated mining and other land destructive industrial activities.

My husband and I moved to Sierra Leone shortly after the war ended to work in a medical clinic for a few years. So much of this book spoke of places I recognize, and I loved reconnecting with these in my mind's eye. But reading about people trying to rebuild their lives immediately following this devastating war was painful -- and insightful -- and thought provoking. It made my heart hurt for my friends there who talk little about that terrible decade. What I had not stopped to contemplate until reading "Radiance" was the difficulty of learning to trust one another again. Thank you, Ishmael, for drawing me deeper into the experience of this country that is so dear to me.

Beah's weaves a magnificent story. It is at once beautiful, hopeful and moving as it is utterly depressing. The catharsis is unbelievable.

A joy to read while describing some of the fatal socio-economic consequences of the mining industry for the Sierra Leonean population.

Amazing story

A very thought provoking book, I enjoyed reading this book, it is very well written, it is the second of his books I have read and will be reading more.

I found this book not quite as good as his original book about boy soldiers. However, it was easy to read and worth it.