Beasts of No Nation

March 1, 2016

Originally published in 2004, then 23-year-old Iweala's debut novel--which began as the author's Harvard senior thesis under the direction of Jamaica Kincaid--reappears 11 years later in two additional incarnations: as an acclaimed film directed by Cory Fukunaga and this mesmerizing audio production narrated by Simon Manyonda. (A 2006 version was read by Nyambi Nyambi.) Manyonda's clipped, staccato voice seamlessly alternates between innocence and horror as young Agu relates the story of his not-yet-teenage life. Before he was forced to become a soldier, Agu was someone's son, someone's brother, a loyal friend, an eager student. His childhood viewpoint, which varies from bewilderment to resignation, fittingly reflects the impossibility of comprehending a war without sides, justification, or reason. Agu holds onto what little humanity he has left, even as survival means committing heinous acts while he is victimized again and again by vicious adults. Forced to become a "beast of no nation," he must somehow continue to believe that he is "not a bad boy." VERDICT Beasts is unrelenting terror. Knowing that some 100,000 to 300,000 young children lived this nightmare is reason enough not to turn away. ["This slim, harrowing account of the intoxication of violence and how quickly it can escalate is a cautionary tale that offers no easy answers or explanations": LJ 9/1/05 review of the HarperCollins hc.]--Terry Hong, Smithsonian BookDragon, Washington, DC

Copyright 2016 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Starred review from August 29, 2005
Iweala's visceral debut is unrelenting in its brutality and unremitting in its intensity. Agu, the precocious, gentle son of a village schoolteacher father and a Bible-reading mother, is dragooned into an unnamed West African nation's mad civil war—a slip of a boy forced, almost overnight, to shoulder a soldier's bloody burden. The preteen protagonist is molded into a fighting man by his demented guerrilla leader and, after witnessing his father's savage slaying, by an inchoate need to belong to some kind of family, no matter how depraved. He becomes a killer, gripped by a muddled sense of revenge as he butchers a mother and daughter when his ragtag unit raids a defenseless village; starved for both food and affection, he is sodomized by his commandant and rewarded with extra food scraps and a dry place to sleep. The subject of the 23-year-old novelist's story—Iweala is American born of Nigerian descent—is gripping enough. But even more stunning is the extraordinarily original voice with which this tale is told. The impressionistic narration by a boy constantly struggling to understand the incomprehensible is always breathless, often breathtaking and sometimes heartbreaking. Its odd singsong cadence and twisted use of tense take a few pages to get used to, but Iweala's electrifying prose soon enough propels a harrowing read.

Starred review from September 1, 2005
(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2005, American Library Association.)

Starred review from September 1, 2005
Have you ever wondered how children become enlisted as soldiers, and men become desensitized to slaughter? Iweala's aptly titled debut takes us into the belly of the beast from the perspective of the school-aged Agu. Separated from his family when a civil war erupts, he is taken captive and adopted as a soldier by a band of lawless men and boys. It could be anywhere and anytime in Africa, when desperation, fear, and hatred fuel bloodshed and inhumanity. Agu is cajoled into his first killing, with his commandant telling him it is like falling in love: "You are just having to doing it, he is saying." The soldiers are told to view their enemies as dogs or goats, as meat. With hunger and confusion propelling him, Agu gets a taste for killing -a taste that galls him in the moments when he lets his guard down. The terror that Agu witnesses and engages in is told in his simple, declarative voice that makes the violence all the more senseless and immediate. This slim, harrowing account of the intoxication of violence and how quickly it can escalate is a cautionary tale that offers no easy answers or explanations. Recommended for public and YA libraries. [See Prepub Alert, "LJ "7/05; see also "Fall Editors' Picks," p. 40 -44.] -Misha Stone, Seattle P.L.

Copyright 2005 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.