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The
Kite Runner
Written
by Khaled Hoseini
Reviewed by Marian Powell
How do you live with yourself after you betray your best friend?
Kite flying is a popular but fiercely competitive sport in Afghanistan.
These two sentences sum up this remarkable first novel. Khaled
Hoseini has lived in the United States since 1981 but was born
and raised in Afghanistan and the background of the novel not
only feels authentic but portrays a vivid picture of life there.
It's a remarkable achievement as the author tries to tell the
life story of a man tormented by memories of a childhood betrayal
and through it the story of Afghanistan in recent decades. He
succeeds to a remarkable degree. It's a good novel to read to
learn what life was like before the Soviet invasion and the Taliban
and then to catch a glimpse of the horrors of life under the Taliban.
The novel is so good it leaves you hoping that the author continues
to write. The Kite Runner is not perfect. As a first novel, the
story suffers from the author trying to accomplish too much. This
is a novel where every character has a dozen motivations for every
action or non-action. Every relationship is complex and complicated
by past histories.
The novel is moving, grim, harrowing at times and always interesting.
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