... eloquently written.

Álvarez writes movingly of his mother's endless shifts at the apple-packing plant and his father's backbreaking labor in fruit picking and construction.

... lyrical if uneven.

Spirit Run is a very different kind of running book.

... an extraordinary debut memoir.

Throughout the book, in between presentations of the run and the runners, Álvarez deeply considers what the run represents. He notes, correctly, that the run stood in defiance of the negative connotations of running historically attached to immigrant populations.

Álvarez debuts with a spellbinding narrative of his coming to terms with his place in America today.

A swift-moving lope across the continent.