RUN ME TO EARTH

Narrator Ramón de Ocampo's even tone is the perfect match for this quiet historical novel. In 1960s Laos, three teenagers orphaned by war find work at a nearby abandoned field hospital. A doctor there helps them to flee the country, but, separated during the escape, their lives spin out in vastly different directions. The story shifts through time, space, and point of view, but de Ocampo's steady narration never wavers. There's a matter-of-factness in his voice that acknowledges the horrors these characters live through without slipping into sensationalism. At its heart, this is an audiobook about the diaspora of war, and about the devastating, rippling, and occasionally redemptive consequences of seemingly minor decisions. De Ocampo's beautiful and brutal narration is as lush and mesmerizing as the prose itself. L.S. © AudioFile 2020, Portland, Maine [Published: FEBRUARY 2020]