Soldiers of Light

by Daniel Bergner

In this moving and unforgettable narrative journalist Daniel Bergner travels into the heart of Sierra Leone, a country torn apart by war. This is the story of the people he encounters in a realm of fire and jungle as they rebuild their Lamin, who lost his hands to save his daughter; Komba, child soldier and sometime cannibal; Neall Ellis, the mercenary pilot with a conscience; Valentine Strasser the embittered ex-dictator; and the Western outsiders trying to save a land of startling beauty and brutality. Shocking, often heartbreaking yet ultimately hopeful, "Soldiers of Light" is a story of survival and a haunting work of literary reportage.

Genres: War, Africa

Paperback

First published January 27, 2005

About the author

Daniel Bergner is a staff writer for the New York Times Magazine and the author of two previous books of nonfiction, IN THE LAND OF MAGIC SOLDIERS: A STORY OF WHITE AND BLACK IN WEST AFRICA, a Los Angeles Times Best Book of the Year, and GOD OF THE RODEO: THE QUEST FOR REDEMPTION IN LOUISIANA’S ANGOLA PRISON, a New York Times Notable Book of the Year.

Bergner’s writing has also appeared in Granta, Harper’s, Mother Jones, Talk, the New York Times Book Review, and on the op-ed page of the New York Times.

Reviews

[Gg · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the most moving books I have ever read. Sometimes, whilst reading I just had to stop because I could not comprehend that children and teenagers (around my age!) experienced such great evil in a world where many people only worry about what car, shoes, clothes or mobile they have. This book made me aware that life is extremely percious and that freedom is so very important...

[Susan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Distressing and frustrating but beautifully written book on Sierra Leone.

[Matt · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is one of the most moving books I've ever read, told in the form of stories by people --children soldiers, those maimed in war, young girls, priests and nuns-- who witnessed unspeakable horrors of the warfare in Sierra Leone. With no support and through sheer determination, the human spirit somehow survived and regained force, even as they could never reconcile the wounds of war, the vast emotions of loss or outrun the haunting memory of the events that defined them.

A fragment of Bergner's intense, evocative writing style, from p. 184:

I used to feel a sense of--eternity....She didn't mention beauty, but I hear it: the graceful curve of a vine bridge sweeping low above a river; the cotton trees with their giant buttresses, chambers of unearthly embrace; the path that bent with elusive promise amid the heartbreaking green. I knew something of what she was trying to evoke, I had experienced, here and there, in Sierra Leone and other countries, a small version of it: the transcendent feeling in an impossibly remote place, the place of splendor and devastation where people were acutely aware of the size of the unknown and where every voice, every song, every drumbeat, every simple act seemed to carry with it, in the immediate background, a ... comforting hint of God.

[Jack · Rating 4 out of 5]

A well written account of the troubles facing Africa. With a balanced narrative on the western worlds influence.