Book Review: The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini

[Reshmi]

The 'Kite Runner' by Khaled Hosseini is about the sweet bond of friendship between two boys Amir and Hassan. Although the book starts off at a slow pace, it becomes unputdownable after the first few chapters. The story based in tumultuous Afghanistan and in America, tracks the life of Amir who is the protagonist. Amir's love for his father almost bordering on hero worship is really heart rendering. The book starts of with Amir and Hassan's childhood and how an incident during the annual kite fighting tournament changes their friendship. These events happen during the Soviet war in Afghanistan and Amir and his father flee to America. Later on Amir returns to Afghanistan and his connection with Hassan is renewed under very different circumstances and gives Amir a chance to redeem himself. Romance and action appear at appropriate times in the book.

'The Kite Runner', has been one of the best books that I read and it gives a new perspective about the people of Afghanistan. For e.g, I always associated the Taliban with Afghanistan and was surprised to learn that Afghanistan was a much more modern and liberated country before the Taliban came to power. I was also able to relate to the kite fighting tournament since, in many parts of India we have similar festivals where people fly kites and kids run after the fallen kites. The language used is quite simple and some of the dialogues will always be etched in memory. Like the time when Hassan tells Amir when he runs after the winning kite 'For you a thousand times over...'. This book is definitely an excellent read. I was so mesmerized by this book that I bought the second book from the author 'A Thousand Splendid Suns' and very recently I was fortunate enough to get his third book, 'And the Mountains Echoed' as a birthday gift. Hopefully you will get to read the reviews on them very soon.

P.S. For those who are more interested in the visual medium, there is a movie based on this book as well with the same title.

[gali]

Duplicated topic

The Kite Runner