Ishmael, his brother Junior, and friends leave for a talent show in Mattru Jong the day rebels attack their home village.

Exhausted refugees arrive in Mattru Jong carrying news that rebels have attacked and destroyed Ishmael's home village of Mogbwemo.

Rebels invade Mattru Jong and surround the village, forcing Ishmael and his companions to flee into the forest under heavy gunfire.

A rebel attack on the village of Kamator scatters the group, and Ishmael is permanently separated from his brother Junior.

After surviving alone in the forest for a month, Ishmael finds a group of former schoolmates and joins them heading toward Yele.

Saidu, the de facto leader of the wandering group of boys, dies suddenly in a friendly village.

Ishmael arrives at the village where his family took shelter only to find it burning and his family's belongings reduced to ash.

Ngor Gasemu leads Ishmael's group to safety through the forest while hiding two fatal bullet wounds, dying once they find the escape route.

Lieutenant Jabati tells the men and boys at the military base they must join the army or leave its protection.

During his first battle in a swamp, Ishmael watches seven-year-old Josiah and friend Musa die, then begins shooting everything that moves.

UNICEF workers arrive at the military base, and Lieutenant Jabati selects Ishmael as one of fifteen boys to be rehabilitated.

Transported to the Benin Home rehabilitation facility in Freetown, Ishmael and the other former soldiers suffer violent drug withdrawal symptoms.

Nurse Esther gives Ishmael a Walkman with rap cassettes, and he opens up about his wartime experiences for the first time.

Ishmael is chosen to represent Sierra Leone as a child soldier spokesperson at the United Nations Children's Conference in New York.

Uncle Tommy falls ill and dies during the military coup; Ishmael flees Sierra Leone and eventually crosses into Guinea.

Ishmael's story begins when a casual trip to a talent show becomes a desperate flight after rebels destroy his home village. He wanders through the forest with a shifting group of companions, losing family and friends to rebel attacks one by one. After arriving at the burning village where his family had been sheltering and finding them gone, Ishmael is forced into the Sierra Leone army and descends into years of drug-fueled combat. At fifteen, UNICEF workers extract him for rehabilitation in Freetown, where nurse Esther begins the slow work of restoring his humanity. His unlikely journey leads to a United Nations conference in New York City, where he finds both a voice and a future adoptive mother. A military coup back home claims his uncle's life, forcing Ishmael to flee the country entirely and cross into Guinea.

The war's headline events from escape to exile.

Village men tie up Ishmael's group accusing them of being rebels, but a boy recognizes a rap cassette name and vouches for them.

After rebels attack Kamator, the imam refuses to reveal where villagers are hiding and is burned alive in the public square.

A herd of wild pigs charges Ishmael while he is alone in the forest and chews at the base of the tree he climbs.

Ishmael's group hears a thunderous roar and discovers the Atlantic Ocean; armed fishermen soon capture them and accuse them of being rebels.

An unnamed Sherbro fisherman heals the boys' severe foot burns with botanical remedies, provides food, and shelters them in his fishing hut.

A village chief orders Ishmael to dance to his rap cassette; satisfied the boys are harmless, the chief releases them.

Saidu tells the group that each time he accepts death, part of him dies, and soon he will become an empty body.

The starving group cooks and eats a crow that falls inexplicably from the sky; Saidu collapses and vomits shortly afterward.

Two seven-year-old recruits, Sheku and Josiah, are assigned to Ishmael's tent and treat him as their protector during military training.

Military officers provide Ishmael's unit with daily supplies of cocaine mixed with gunpowder and amphetamines to sustain their capacity for combat.

Five boys in Ishmael's unit are ordered to compete at killing bound prisoners; Ishmael is declared the winner.

Ishmael performs a Julius Caesar monologue and a rap song at the Benin Home talent show, impressing visiting UNICEF officials.

Ishmael's childhood friend Mohamed arrives at the Benin Home rehabilitation center, and the two boys joyfully reunite and reminisce about home.

Ishmael and Mohamed venture into Freetown's streets during coup chaos to buy food, narrowly escaping gunfire and a strafing helicopter.

After his uncle dies, Ishmael reaches Laura Simms in New York by collect call, and she agrees to take him in.

Beyond the headline events of the war, Ishmael's survival depends on a series of tense encounters and unexpected moments of human kindness. Suspicious villagers repeatedly accuse the boys of being rebels, yet individual acts of generosity — a fisherman's healing hands, a chief's mercy — keep them alive. The group's gradual disintegration is foreshadowed by Saidu's dark prophecies and sealed when the boys eat a fallen crow before his death. Inside the army, Ishmael is transformed by mandatory drug use and ordered brutality, including a chilling prisoner-killing contest. His recovery at the Benin Home is punctuated by a joyful reunion with his childhood friend Mohamed and a talent show performance that catches the attention of UNICEF officials. The final events show Ishmael's desperate civilian life unraveling under a new coup, saved ultimately by a transatlantic phone call.

The encounters and experiences that shaped the journey.

Ishmael watches a man weep over a van filled with the dead bodies of his wife and children as refugees flood the roads.

Junior grows unnaturally quiet and stares at the sky for hours; Ishmael later regrets never asking his brother how he truly felt.

A family at a river refuses to let Ishmael approach, making him realize that even a twelve-year-old boy is no longer trusted.

A lone crippled old man in a deserted village draws the boys a map in the dirt directing them toward safety in Yele.

All the village dogs cry out through the entire night for no apparent reason, filling Ishmael with a premonition of disaster.

After finding his family's house burned to ash, Ishmael furiously attacks Gasemu, the man who was guiding them to safety.

A soldier grabs Ishmael's old shorts during military induction and throws them into a fire, melting the rap cassette tapes hidden inside.

Lieutenant Jabati, recognizing Ishmael as the boy who once quoted Shakespeare at recruitment, recites a line from Macbeth back at him.

Ishmael and other residents beat supply manager Poppay unconscious over a mattress dispute; Ishmael afterward recalls feeling he needed more violence.

Ishmael collapses from a severe migraine at the Benin Home and wakes to find nurse Esther has been caring for him.

Esther and Ishmael walk through Freetown at night; the sight of the moon prompts him to recall his grandmother's teaching about kindness.

At the UN conference, Ishmael abandons his prepared remarks and tells the audience that he is a child, not a soldier.

Laura Simms sees Ishmael shivering without a winter coat in New York City and gives him her own coat to wear.

Classmates at St. Edward's Secondary School discover Ishmael and Mohamed's past as soldiers and refuse to socialize with either of them.

Ishmael resolves the childhood monkey parable by deciding he would shoot the monkey to spare everyone else from an impossible choice.

The most pivotal moments in Ishmael's story are the quiet turning points that reveal how war reshapes identity, trust, and the capacity for hope. Early signs of damage — a brother's silent despair, a child's realization that he is no longer trusted — foreshadow the losses ahead. The destruction of Ishmael's rap cassettes during military induction marks the final severing from his former self, while his irrational attack on his rescuer Gasemu reveals the rage that combat has lodged inside him. At the rehabilitation center, small acts of care from nurse Esther gradually crack open his frozen heart, and a moonlit walk through Freetown reconnects him to the spiritual teachings of his grandmother. Ishmael reclaims his identity at the UN conference by declaring himself a child, not a soldier. He closes the memoir by resolving a childhood parable — a philosophical act of choosing to end impossible choices rather than perpetuate them.