Massacres in Sierra Leone on RED GROUND: The Forgotten Conflict

RED GROUND is different than my other thrillers. While it cannot be called a true account of actual events, there's a thin line between the truth and fiction. This book is raw and bloody and relates the often forgotten plight of the people of Sierra Leone.

Here it is... RED GROUND: The Forgotten Conflict
Genre: Suspense Thriller
Book Cover Designed by Eeva Lancaster, The Book Khaleesi
Edited by Eeva Lancaster


Africa gets into my blood. Western and developed Asian countries have all used, and in many ways abused, what exists in Africa... although they also contributed a lot of good in fighting disease, poverty and instituting education.

I remember being struck heavily by Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness set in the then Belgian Congo. Corruption was the name of the game.

And this happens all over Africa. Countries like Sierra Leone and Angola, rich in minerals like copper, gold and diamonds, became targets of savvy, Western geological outfits and rogue African states. Often forming hidden alliances to extract the maximum possible wealth from the ground, for the lowest possible cost.

That lowest possible cost was human life.

Sierra Leone was a prime example. The RUF, whilst proclaiming an agenda of equality, was a ruthless power and wealth hungry monster. They killed and horrendously mutilated any who opposed them and also rendered the same to any inhabitant: man, woman or child in any village or town. Children were forced to perform parricide and sexual violations... if they wished to remain alive.

International outrage remained what it was, outrage. Not much else.

The real changes came from undercover specialised soldiery, government supported and mercenary or semi-mercenary forces. Seeing amputee sports and football teams came as quite a shock. Many of them just kids. All victims of the RUF.

It’s a story that a few writers have told. I’ve added my own words to it, albeit in a totally fictitious way.

The proclamation of the State of Salonga is a work of pure invention, but given what was going on, and looking back on Emperor Bokassa of Central Africa, it’s not far from what could have happened. The use of fiction dramatizes the reality and I have done so to highlight the horror and absurdity of the situation. Like Rwanda, little was done to save lives.

The story of Africa must be told, repeatedly, for us to remember and honour the suffering of its people... and perhaps, one day, humanity will learn from it, and their lives and deaths would not have been in vain.