Before the Dawn: An Autobiography - Hardcover

Adams, Gerry

3.8

304 ratings by Goodreads

9780688143121: Before the Dawn: An Autobiography

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0688143121 ISBN 13: 9780688143121

Publisher: William Morrow & Co, 1997

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The controversial president of Ireland's Sinn Fein describes his life as a young boy growing up in a small Irish town, his first stages of involvement with the IRA and the turbulent times during the revolutionary period, and modern-day peace talks with the British.

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Review:

Closing in 1981 with the deaths of ten Irish Republican Army hunger strikers in Long Kesh prison, the author chronicles the years before he became president of Sinn Fein, the I.R.A.'s political wing. Wrenching accounts of the hunger strike and of the 1969 riots in Northern Ireland that turned a 20-year-old bartender into an activist are counterbalanced by the warmth with which Adams portrays his family and comrades, the atmospheric precision with which he evokes the sights and sounds of his West Belfast community. Not the whole truth by any means, but a compelling partisan document.

From the Publisher:

Gerry Adams has been at the forefront of Northern Ireland's struggle for nearly three decades, taking leadership positions and guiding his country in negotiating peace talks with England for the first time in their tumultuous history. Now, in Before the Dawn, Adams recounts his years growing up in the Irish countryside and, with startling detail, his early involvement in the IRA.

Adams includes engaging stories of his boyhood and never-before-told family tales. His description of his critical role in Northern Ireland's violent and dramatic revolutionary period will haunt and intrigue readers. Ireland instills the strongest of emotions in her offspring, and Adams is no exception. Lyrical and riveting, Before the Dawn explores the origins of one of this century's most compelling men.

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