The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini

My first stop around the world for the Orbis Terrarum Challenge was in Afghanistan (though it is not the first book I am reviewing for that challenge). It is also my third book for the Eponymous Reading Challenge. As I expected, I finished The Kite Runner in three days. Couldn’t make it in less because of work and some other obligations.

Amir and Hassan grow up together in 1970s Afghanistan. Hassan is the son of the servant of Amir and his father and a Hazara, while Amir is a Pashtun. Hassan is devoted to Amir, but Amir is unable (or maybe also unwilling in a way) to look past their different status and origins (the Pashtun being a more powerful tribe/people in Afghanistan) and recognize the relationship for what it really is: a friendship.

This all changes radically one day, when Amir watches how Hassan is getting raped by the neighborhood bully (well, bully migh actually be an understatement). I don’t think mentioning this is much of a spoiler, after all the attention given to the movie and in particular to the Afghan boys playing Amir and Hassan, who had to flee Afghanistan before the release of the movie, because of the rape-scene in the movie.

After the invasion of Afghanistan by the Soviet Union in 1979, Amir and his father emigrate to the US, where they have to build up a whole new life. By that time Hassan and his father have already disappeared from Amir’s life. Amir grows up, graduates, gets married, and becomes a writer. Then, in 2001 he gets a phone call that sends him back to Afghanistan to confront his past.

The book touches on a lot of issues: identity, father-son relationships, immigration, adoption, lost childhood, but the main themes of the book are redemption and how one choice can define a person and change one’s entire life.

After finishing the book, I was most curious about the fate of little Sohrab. Those who have read the book, will probably know  I hope that Hosseini will some day write a sequel from Sohrab’s point of view or with him as the main character.

Especially in the second part of the book, the storyline gets a bit predictable. But Khaled Hosseini still managed to keep my attention and I did want to keep on reading. Actually, for me story came in waves, the first part grabbed me, then it had me losing my attention some and thinking “I hope it will get better again”. More or less at that point, the story’s pace went up again, and it took me with it fast. Then, towards the end, the pace slowed down again, but this time not in an annoying way. It fitted the story just fine at that point.

I loved the book, Hosseini is a great storyteller and drags you right in. However, I found it not nearly as good as A Thousand Splendid Suns. There were parts where I was just as sucked in to The Kite Runner as I was in the other book, but there were just as many parts that I read very detachedly.

I didn’t connect to the characters in The Kite Runner like I did with Laila and Mariam in A Thousand Splendid Suns. Maybe because Laila and Mariam are women, maybe because what Amir did was morally wrong (but somehow in a way understandable at the same time). A Thousand Splendid Suns just wouldn’t let me go, I couldn’t put the book away, because I wanted to know what would happen next, and I was left thinking about the book for days afterwards. The Kite Runner was relatively easier to put away both during the reading and afterwards.

But you know what? The Kite Runner was Khaled Hosseini’s first novel, A Thousand Splendid Suns his second. If Hosseini keeps the pattern going, that puts the bar for his third novel very high.;-)

My review of A Thousand Splendid Suns is here. Incidentally, according to my stats page, it is by far the most viewed post of my blog: about twice as popular as the second most popular post.