Kite Runner. My take.

if you haven't read this book by Khaled Hosseini (his debut novel) - you have to...i started the book this afternoon and only stopped for dinner...i don't want to give away more than the back cover...briefly its a story of two boys growing up in kabul - one the son of a powerful merchant, the other the son of their servant...the story unfolds from the early 1970s through present day Afghanistan - so mixed in is a backdrop of the comings and goings of religious/political turmoil...i just thought i would talk about a few things that i took from this book...(note that some of the accounts in the book will make you uncomfortable)

the story is definitely haunting...i think it will take me a few days at least to stop thinking about the main characters - hassan and amir...Hosseini did a great job with character development...i think i identified with the story more because i'm a guy and i could relate to some of the boyhood in the story - especially flying and running kites...i want to say more but i know some of you are reading this book - so i won't...

i thought one of the lines from the book was pretty thoughtful - there is only one sin in the world - lying...everything else is just a variation of lying...think about that - the book will definitely explain if you're at a loss....

the book highlights loyalty...perhaps this is given a centerpiece because it is so interwined in the fabric of pashtun culture...i can identify with that as well...yet the book takes loyalty to where it becomes a fault...that really troubled me...it made the story dark for me...yet it was necessary to give the story life...to make you question why such loyalty existed in the world...

there is one line in the book that is a delight for pessimists and really grabbed me - one character says, "I'm so profoundly happy . . . . Happiness like this is frightening . . . . They only let you be this happy if they're preparing to take something from you." i know that line is somewhat like the daily fortune in the paper - hindsight is always 20/20...but i dunno - the pessimist in me identified with that line...my past can definitely attest.

the other line in the book that really connected was when one of the characters, beaten at life, resigned to his fate says - "I want my old life back." i definitely know of moments some time ago when i might have muttered the same...

finally - the story is ultimately about redemption...i'm not giving anything away - the book starts off with the foreshadowing comment - "there is a way to be good again..." here...redemption is ugly as it should be...and the ugliness is begged for, but cowardice keeps it at bay...and so as times passes, life only makes it even more wretched than it started out being...my question is - when an inherent character flaw is the foundation of your mistake that haunts you for the rest of your life...is it fair to burden your conscience? to make you atone for that supposedly involuntary sin?

but in the end...the book haunting and melancholic as it may be is just great literature...its powerful...it makes you think...it connects...wraps you into the story...in fact - i who have never been to afghanistan and thought it to be a land of bleak mountains and ruthless clerics found myself connecting to the land and its culture...part of this may have to do with some of its ties to a common culture in the indian subcontinent...but part of it was simply the powerful writing...involving the reader so that he was not an outsider...of course there are some literary flaws in the plots/characters/storytelling - but this is his first novel...and to say in the words of rahim kaka - bravo.