The book "Running for My Life: One Lost Boy's Journey from the Killing Fields of Sudan to the Olympic Games" by Lopez Lomong describes the author's journey from the civil war in Sudan through refugee camps in Africa to an adoption by a family in the USA and finally becoming a bona fide medal contender at the 2012 Olympic Games in London. Lopez, whose birthday is listed as January 1, as with many adopted children from the Sudan who arrived in the USA without papers, was born in Sudan to a loving family, but then abducted and forced to fight in the bloody and gruesome civil war that is still ongoing in that country. Able to escape a life as a child soldier, he made it into a refugee camp, where he started to run as a means of making it onto the soccer team. Seeing soccer as the real sport and running simply as a means to an end, Lopez needed to be bribed by his high school coach to join the track team, but then emerged as a very talented runner, ending up with an athletic scholarship to attend college.
In the process of becoming a nationally ranked runner and seeing running as a sport, Lopez had to learn other things about life in the USA as well as life in a country not ravaged by civil war. Despite the horrific years in the Sudan, Lopez emerged through it all as a well adjusted young man that manages to keep an optimistic outlook on life.
The book is full of humor and a strong belief in the good of humanity and through it all shows the reader how resilient the human spirit can be. Even if Lopez was not a nationally ranked runner, this book would be worth reading just to expose outsiders to the civil war in Sudan through the eyes of a young boy and contrast these years to the life most of us take for granted in the USA.
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| book is available on amazon.com here |
Disclaimer:
I received a free copy of the book through booksneeze.com in
exchange for an honest review. The opinion expressed in this review are
my own and have not been influenced by either booksneeze or the author.
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