Run Me to Earth

In Paul Yoon's "Run Me to Earth," he considers the ghosts that haunt all of us as we age: childhood friends, the kindnesses of strangers, the horrors that resurface when our memories are nudged by a single bird calling to its mate.

The particular ghosts in this small, graceful, and very literary novel may be too familiar to some readers as they rise like the morning mist out of the humidity of Laos. Laos, like Cambodia, was a pawn in the brutal chess game waged in Vietnam by the French and then the Americans.

Some of you remember, I'm sure, the devastation wrought by both countries in Southeast Asia. The excuse of multiple administrations and governments? Making the world safe for democracy.

Ask Noi, Prany, and Alisak how safe their show more young lives really were. Ask them about the Plain of Jars and the buried incendiary bombs they navigated to bring medical supplies back to the doctors and nurses at a makeshift civilian hospital. Ask them about the fragile comfort they gave at the hospital to mangled, bedridden blast survivors pumped full of the last morphine. Ask them about the moments of near nighttime quiet when, laying entwined together for warmth, they'd share their hopes about where they might be taken as refugees. Thailand? France?

This novel is a must-read for any who lived through that era of misguided interference fueled by the privileged arrogance of first-world governments. And, for those somewhat younger, this novel and its ghosts will speak to the very same endless chess game being played out now in the Middle East and South America. show less

Run Me to Earth by Paul Yoon (5 stars)

Laos in the 1960s is in the throes of civil war and is under heavy aerial bombardment by the USA.
Alisak, Prany and Noi have lost their parents and are surviving by whatever means they can. By
1969 where the novel opens, the three teenagers are running dangerous missions across fields of
bombs, collecting medical supplies, the injured, food, messages, for a makeshift hospital set up in
a remote farmhouse.

I finished this book with an ache in my heart. We’re so familiar with the history of neighbouring
Vietnam but I had no idea of the desperate and dark history of 1960s and 1970s Laos. Paul Yoon
has a lightness of touch which conveys fear and hope, compassion and brutality, the bonds and
friendship and the show more ties of war. This is a novel I will remember. show less

Run Me to Earth has received some enthusiastic pre-publication buzz—and I want to open by saying that buzz is well deserved. At less than 300 pages, Run Me to Earth is a relatively quick read, but its characters and scope consistently invite the reader to slow down and to appreciate what author Paul Yoon has accomplished.

Run Me to Earth tells the story of three children in Laos, orphaned by war, who work together as couriers for a "freelance" field hospital run by a very independent doctor. As the war ends, the doctor arranges to have the children taken out of Laos in a final round of airlifts, but things don't go as planned and the three are separated. Run Me to Earth is the story of how their lives play out on multiple show more continents.

One of the beauties of Run Me to Earth is that each chapter has a different narrator, which lets the reader see the world from the perspective of each of the children and through the eyes of other characters. A not-quite-chronological structure emphasizes the composite nature of the narrative as the reader pieces together events, filling in gaps along the way. This structure feels particularly fitting for a novel that begins in the chaos of war.

Run me to Earth is definitely one of 2020's must-reads. show less

Run Me to Earth by Paul Yoon is the story of three teen-aged children who have known nothing but war their whole lives. Alisak, along with brother and sister Prany and Noi are orphans who are alive through their own cunning and abilities. From 1964 to 1973 the tiny country of Laos became the most heavily bombed country per capita as estimated2 million tons of ordnance was dropped by the U.S. Air Force.

Through a series of interwoven short stories the author tells the story of these orphans and their fight for survival. Opening in 1969, the children have taken refuge in a makeshift hospital, they assist the staff and act as couriers for a small salary and shelter. The hospital is surrounded by land mines and many patients are blown to show more bits as they try to make their way to the hospital. As the bombing comes ever closer the hospital is evacuated. In the rush to escape, the three children become separated. Throughout the multiple narratives we learn the fate of each child and what the future held for them.

Run Me To Earth is a story of war and the trauma it leaves in it’s wake. Powerful and intense the author has produced a descriptive and layered novel that defines the various directions a displaced person’s life can take. My only quibble with this book was that the frequent jumps in time and the many POVs expressed became a little confusing at times. show less

The word that comes to mind for me is: "well-intentioned."

Why it didn't work better for me: the narrative voice is distancing, formal, and a little vague. Everything felt mysteriously shrouded. I wasn't let into the story.

I have a feeling that these characters might live large, rich, three-dimensional lives in Yoon’s imagination, but when it came to writing the words down, he wouldn’t let loose of his literary intention to let these characters tell their story.

This was a tough read due to violent (but true) subject matter - but that’s on me because it is something I knew nothing about: the literal decimation of Laos as a side effect of the Vietnam War. Guilty parties: the US, France and North Vietnam. According to the author’s note, bombing missions from 1964-1973 totaled more than 580,000 = to one bombardment every eight minutes for 24 hours for nine years. It also left the landscape full of undetonated shells. The story itself is fictional focusing on three childhood friends, as teenagers and fast forward into years after the war. Prany and Noi are brother and sister, Alisak is their next door neighbor. They are orphans and totally on their own during these war years and get recruited show more to help in a makeshift field hospital for big American bucks. Basically they are untrained orderlies working under Vang, a local altruistic doctor. From him they learn French and realities of a bigger world and flat out survival. When the time comes to evacuate due to unsustainability of their situation, they all get separated from each other and splinter off into individual stories and life trajectories. Alisak ends up in France, Vang and Prany are arrested and tortured, and Noi’s fate is undetermined. A generation later, a chance encounter with Khit, a patient’s daughter, is the glue that brings their stories back together. That part is very touching and healing, but otherwise hard to grapple with the atrocities and culpability. A reviewer cites the book as an example of “the transformative power of literature” - fact show less

Yoon tells the story of three friends torn from their homes and families by the Laotian conflict in the 1960’s. The three children, Noi, Pranny, and Alisak have taken refuge in the home of a Frenchman who fled the violence. The home, damaged by bombs and the humid climate, has been turned into a field hospital. Helping the doctors and coming face to face with the horror of war, the children cope as best they can. They all plan to leave with the doctors hoping the helicopters will take them to France or to Thailand. Only Alisak makes it onto the helicopter, leaving the other two behind when a hidden bomb destroys Noi’s motorcycle. Alisak makes it to France, not knowing what happened to the others. The daughter of a woman for whom show more Alisak cared in the Laos hospital escapes to New York and is determined to find Alisak and tell him about Noi’s death and the capture of Pranny and the doctor. I found hope and simple beauty and caring amidst the chaos and violence of war and finished the book with far more hope than I expected to find. show less