A Thousand Splendid Suns (Hardcover) by Khaled Hosseini - Reviews, Discussion, Bookclubs, Lists

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12/04/07

Lucy rated it:

Read in January, 2008

For the last two months I have been putting off reading this book. For starters, I bought the book at an airport in Taiwan, which meant it didn't have a due date which meant it took a backseat to many books that I didn't have the luxury of reading whenever.

Additionally, because I've heard so much about this book already, I almost didn't want to read it at all. I've heard that it's depressing, that it's not as good as The Kite Runner, and that it's basically a novel about the brutal t...more For the last two months I have been putting off reading this book. For starters, I bought the book at an airport in Taiwan, which meant it didn't have a due date which meant it took a backseat to many books that I didn't have the luxury of reading whenever.

Additionally, because I've heard so much about this book already, I almost didn't want to read it at all. I've heard that it's depressing, that it's not as good as The Kite Runner, and that it's basically a novel about the brutal treatment of women in Afghanistan.

You know when you read a book or see a film that has had great reviews and you finish feeling disappointed because it didn't live up to the hype? My experience reading this book was the complete opposite. I loved it. I didn't feel the message of the book was one of brutality or depression, but of hope and the toughness of the human spirit.

There are plenty of awful scenes to lend credence to its reputation. While the story's time frame spans thirty years, the main focus of the novel are two woman, a generation apart, whose lives cross as they become the wives of the same man, Rasheed. The elder, Mariam, was born to a servant woman out of wedlock and is raised in banishment, ignorance and eventual rejection during the years the Afghani government was controlled by the communists. She finds herself forced to marry a much older man after her mother commits suicide. Laila, fifteen years younger and raised by intellectual parents, enters the marriage under much different circumstances. Alone after a bomb destroys her home and kills her parents, and pregnant by her childhood love who has fled the country, she marries Rasheed in a desperate attempt to save her unborn child.

The writing engrossed me. Much like the Kite Runner, Hosseini magically puts the reader in the city, neighborhood and house of his characters. Much to his credit, I found myself torn between wanting to yell at Laila to hush up, so that she'd avoid another beating, and kicking Rasheed myself, because he is a despicable brute.

Mariam, one of the most tragic characters in literature, makes this book what it is; a story of love and strenghth. She, who didn't have an easy day in her life, allows herself to be touched by the love of Laila and her children. In return, she performs the ultimate act of love and saves a family.

I appreciate Hosseini's portrayal of a part of the world that is under so much scrutiny lately. Afghanistan, and the city of Kabul where the story takes place, have a long history of wars and occupations which result in a great chasm between different ethnic tribes, Islam, economic classes and gender. Hosseini uses this novel to tell the story of Afghani women and the hardships that face them with each regime change.

As a woman, I feel blessed to have been given confidence and opportunities. I truly cannot imagine what it would be like to live under the conditions the women in this book live under. I am grateful to be born to the family I was born to and in a country which allows me to live the kind of life I choose.

Miram and Laila didn't have the opportunities or support that I have. And yet they survived. They endured and they reached out to others, despite their circumstances. In this, Hosseini redeems all of Afghanistan by showing these two women's humanity. He shows that in a place whose beauty was written about in a 17th century poem, where "One could not count the moons that shimmer on her roofs and the thousand splendid suns that hide behind her walls" is a city that can become illuminated once again.(less)

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07/17/07

Don rated it:

Read in August, 2007

Suns is part historical fiction, part social commentary and part kick-in-the-throat storytelling. A friend of mine said that Suns is a metaphor for Afghanistan but I found it illustrative of Afghanistan's weary and violent history; I found it brutally educational. When I had studied in Germany in 1987, I lived in an international dormitory. I asked my neighbor, Hyder, where he was from, he leaned in to me with a devilish grin and hissed “Afghanistan!” While others found this amusing, the...more

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03/16/08

Rachel rated it:

Has a copy to sell/swap — Read in March, 2008

recommended to Rachel by: middle class liberal white woman
recommends it for: middle class liberal white women

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here.

a good story. it was easy to read and went really quickly. liberal white women will love this book. thank allah i'm an uptight radical.

hosseini was disappointing for me for several reasons...

1. this text and the kite runner are touted for their 'brave and unapologetic' look at the hidden lives of those suffering/maybe surviving in (the predominantly taliban-controlled era) afghanistan. whatever. this is the same story is the same story is the same story. i think t...more a good story. it was easy to read and went really quickly. liberal white women will love this book. thank allah i'm an uptight radical.

hosseini was disappointing for me for several reasons...

1. this text and the kite runner are touted for their 'brave and unapologetic' look at the hidden lives of those suffering/maybe surviving in (the predominantly taliban-controlled era) afghanistan. whatever. this is the same story is the same story is the same story. i think the one woman even gets to paint her fingernails in the end. the topic is not so tired but the way it's addressed is- woman sold/war-torn into abusive patriarchal muslim culture, woman persevere, woman get comeuppance. well, the young pretty one that is loved by another male character- but i'll attack that later. if mid-east gender injustice is your thing, read "woman at point zero" out of egypt by saadawi or watch "osama" about afghanistan. both of these address these topics in much more eloquent and interesting ways and without (or at least done better) the false feminism.

2. speaking of false feminism- this book is about women in relation to men. the plot and character development consistently rely on a male character. at one point it attempts to make the story about the relationship between the women, but, nope, back to relying on dudes. the women characters barely exist if it weren't for the men in their lives. boring.

3. it perfectly fits into the western literary canon. the narrative is linear and pov is labeled by chapter. it's been written for a western audience by a non-western author about a non-western topic, i want it to respect my intelligence and write in a non-western style. it lacks the cadence and artistic quality of middle eastern literature that makes these horrible stories alive and therefore devastating (as they should be).

4. the characters and their fates are generic and predictable. the story line follows popular heteronormative tropes about what is a worthwhile destiny and consequently a valuable life. one woman, mariam, is beheaded for killing her husband while trying to save the sister wife, laila. mariam is old, infertile, supposedly unattractive and up until this point has had no radical ideas of her own. laila however is young, beautiful, educated, fertile, rebellious, and has another man that she can run away with whom loves her. the sequence of events suggests to me the same old ideas about what is a livable and grievable life. boo. i don't like that this story tells me that this makes sense, that mariam has to die as a symbol because her life was recognized as less valuable and ergo less livable.

i've dealt this book a good deal of hateration it might not totally deserve but i feel like if you're going to be hanging around the new york times book list you should live up to it. leave the western style to white dudes. um, but, good story though...(less)

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08/29/07

Anu rated it:

Read in March, 2008

August 2007

I was riding in a cab in Bombay recently, and a bookseller on foot approached me at a traffic light with a stack of books. I did my best not to look at the boy, but I couldn't help it. He was waving several books in my face and something caught my eye. I thought my glance was discreet, but he saw me look.. and it was game over. The light turned green right then and the boy starts running with the cab yelling 'Memsahib! Memsahib!'. We're picking up speed.. I'm so scared he'...more

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09/13/08

Khaya rated it:

bookshelves: intense-sad, islamicwomen

recommended to Khaya by: Shelly
recommends it for: People who actually thought "The Kite Runner" was a good book

To my editor:

Khaled here. As I was reviewing my final draft of “A Thousand Splendid Suns,” some questions occurred to me.

1. Could I make the characters any less complex? Despite my efforts, I feel I haven’t fully achieved the one-dimensionality my readers seemed to love in “The Kite Runner.” Specifically, I’m afraid I may have given Rassan one or two potentially sympathetic moments early on despite his overall abusive personality (although I more than make...more

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12/15/07

Janeciab rated it:

Read in January, 2007

My review from the Los Angeles Times Book Review:

Afghani-born novelist Khaled Hosseini enthralled readers with “The Kite Flyer,” his first novel, which was constructed around the friendship between Amir, a privileged Pashtun Sunni born in Kabul, and his boyhood friend and servant Hassan, a Shi’a, ethnic Hazara and master kite runner who, in the course of running to ground the coveted last fallen kite of the winter tournament in 1975, has a violent encounter that changes both b...more My review from the Los Angeles Times Book Review:

Afghani-born novelist Khaled Hosseini enthralled readers with “The Kite Flyer,” his first novel, which was constructed around the friendship between Amir, a privileged Pashtun Sunni born in Kabul, and his boyhood friend and servant Hassan, a Shi’a, ethnic Hazara and master kite runner who, in the course of running to ground the coveted last fallen kite of the winter tournament in 1975, has a violent encounter that changes both boys’ lives.

“The Kite Flyer,” which has sold 4 million copies in the U.S. alone, introduced an American audience to Afghan culture. Now that Hosseini is the mega selling guy to beat instead of unknown author of the sleeper hit, how does “A Thousand Splendid Suns” hold up? I put it to the ultimate test.

I read the new Hosseini novel during a recent airplane trip, while going through the kiosk check-in, bag check-in, security check--shoeless, Baggie and book in hand. I read while waiting in the airport with coffee, and aboard the flight, surrounded by screaming babies, with the guy in front of me, seat back, virtually napping on my lap. Could the thread of Hosseini’s story stay with me through all of that plus the return flight, in which I endured a two-hour wait in San Francisco (decent sushi and Peet’s coffee), then five-plus hours in the air? That’s a lot of ask of any author. But Hosseini has the storytelling gift. Suspended in the otherworldly zone of airplane travel, I discovered the fictional village of Gul Daman, the minarets, bazaars and gardens of Herat, the snow-capped mountains and communal tandoors of Kabul. I had not been so engrossed while simultaneously so distracted since I picked up James Michener’s “Hawaii” at a flea market during the post-9/11 trauma, on Manhattan island. Michener, a Pulitzer-award winning pioneer of the mixture of historic fact and fiction that is standard today, describes Hawaii from the perspective of the original islanders (“Havaiki that has lived in our hearts for forty and fifty and sixty generations”) as vividly as he does a massive volcanic eruption (“It was a night of terror, fearful in its strangeness and paralyzing in its power”) and ensuing tsunami.

Hosseini, too, offers us the sweep of historic upheavals narrated with the intimacy of family and village life. In his new novel he weaves together the stories of two Afghani women over several decades of turmoil.

Mariam is the bastard daughter of a wealthy Herat businessman and his housekeeper. Born in 1959, raised in a hut on the outskirts of town where she is visited weekly by her father. After her mother’s suicide when she is 15, Mariam’s father marries her off to a shoemaker named Rasheed. He is a traditional Pashtun who moves her to Kabul, and insists she wear a burqa. When Mariam is unable to bear Rasheed a child despite many miscarriages, he treats her with increasing cruelty.

He takes as a second wife Laila, daughter of Tajik neighbors. Laila, who has throughout her childhood loved a neighbor boy, Tariq, becomes his lover just before he and his family leave Afghanistan. Within days, her parents are killed when their house is bombed. Rasheed takes her in and marries her. Over time, as Laila gives birth to two chilren, she and Mariam bond through the common experience of housekeeping, childrearing and submitting to Rasheed’s sadistic domination.

What keeps this novel from being another “plucked from the headlines” docudrama is Hosseini’s eye for the textures of daily life, and his ability to portray a full range of human emotions, from the smoldering rage of an abused woman to the early flutters of love a woman feels when she discovers she is pregnant. “A Thousand Splendid Suns” is a worthy sequel to “The Kite Flyer.
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01/13/08

Erie rated it:

bookshelves: fiksi

Read in February, 2008

The story sets in a "war zone" Afghanistan which is Hosseini does his good job provides me with a glimpse of the history of Afghanistan. Although I feel the story moves slowly in the 1st and 2nd part of the book. The story is really flowing for me when Mariam and Laila lives become intertwined. From this point this book simply unputdownable. Mariam and Laila forged an alliance and harboring resentment against a violent and brutal Rasheed whose happen to be their husband (I really want ...more

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01/25/08

Ruth rated it:

bookshelves: fiction

Read in October, 2007

recommended to Ruth by: Cara
recommends it for: Teens and up

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here.

I have finished reading A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini. I have never cried so much while reading a book.

I must say first, that for not being a woman or a mother, Hosseini sure understands what it feels like to be one. His descriptions of the range of emotions the women in this book experience, and the decisions they make, is so honest...his female characters are so real, that it is hard to believe that this book was written by a man. Quite amazing.

The book fo...more I have finished reading A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini. I have never cried so much while reading a book.

I must say first, that for not being a woman or a mother, Hosseini sure understands what it feels like to be one. His descriptions of the range of emotions the women in this book experience, and the decisions they make, is so honest...his female characters are so real, that it is hard to believe that this book was written by a man. Quite amazing.

The book follows the lives of two women living in Kabul, Afghanistan from the time of the war with the Soviets until the Taliban is defeated. The women live separate lives until awful cirumstances bring them together halfways through the book. I don't want to give anything away for those of you who haven't read the book yet, but the themes in this story are heartbreaking. The lies taught by men about the worthlessness of women. Parents rejecting their children to save their reputations. A government that believes a man has a right to beat, or even kill, his wife in the comfort of his own home, while the wife does not have the right even to defend. A country living through a neverending war, where power is taken and lost so many times it is impossible to keep track of who is firing the rockets. The loss of everything dear to you in a split second. The agony of watching your children deteriorate before your eyes, while you are powerless to help them. The situations these women are placed in brought me to tears so many times I lost count.

There is beauty in this book, too: the ultimate loving sacrifice of a mother figure who's life was otherwise filled with barrenness and sorrow. The hope of redemption. The joy of discovering what you thought was forever lost. The ability, even after a life where nearly everything you had was stripped violently away from you, to love again. And to give.

This book really puts into perspective how easy my life is here. How little I know of loss, of struggle, of sacrifice. Maybe my parents weren't perfect. Maybe I don't have a dream job. Maybe people and circumstances in my life can get on my nerves from time to time. Maybe I worry about having enough money. But I have no fear that my children will have to be put out to beg so my family can survive, or that I will have to leave them at an orphanage because I can't provide for them. I don't listen to the sound of rockets overhead at night and wonder who will be found dead when I wake up. And I have a husband that loves and respects me, and shows our daughters every day how important they are to him. After reading this book I realize I have no reason to complain about anything in my life, ever again. No reason at all.

This book was really hard for me to read, especially as a mother. But I am so glad I did. Please do yourselves a favor and read it too.

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12/10/07

Tom rated it:

Book Review

A Thousand Splendid Suns
By Khaled Hosseini

Reviewed by Tom Carrico

It’s amazing that this author has the #1 fiction paperback (The Kite Runner) and the #1 fiction hardback (A Thousand Splendid Suns) on “The New York Times” bestseller list. The Kite Runner has sold over four millions copies since its release in 2003. It is a hauntingly written novel set in war-torn Afghanistan. It is exceptionally well plotted and opens the window on a p...more Book Review

A Thousand Splendid Suns
By Khaled Hosseini

Reviewed by Tom Carrico

It’s amazing that this author has the #1 fiction paperback (The Kite Runner) and the #1 fiction hardback (A Thousand Splendid Suns) on “The New York Times” bestseller list. The Kite Runner has sold over four millions copies since its release in 2003. It is a hauntingly written novel set in war-torn Afghanistan. It is exceptionally well plotted and opens the window on a part of the world that very few of us are familiar with. The two boys in The Kite Runner are from different socio-economic circumstance but forge a friendship which transcends politics, war and economics. Even though this story is set in Afghanistan, it is a story of childhood betrayal and its consequences and could really have been set anywhere. It is a great story wonderfully told, however, and the fact that it takes place in a land few of us understand makes it educational as well as entertaining.

To use a baseball metaphor, if The Kite Runner was a home run, A Thousand Splendid Suns, the author’s second effort, is a game winning walk-off grand slam. The author has managed to tell the modern history of Afghanistan: from the end of the monarchy to the invasion of the Soviets to the chaos of rule by the war lords to the tight fisted maniacal rule of the Taliban to the post-9/11 return to some semblance of relative normalcy. The author again uses the device of telling the stories of two main characters of differing backgrounds, this time women. The first, Mariam, is the illegitimate daughter of a wealthy businessman in Herat. The book opens with the story of Mariam’s childhood. She is sequestered on the outskirts of the city in a clay hut with her mother. Her father visits once weekly and servants from his house bring basic supplies. Mariam’s mother is understandably bitter and the tension between mother and daughter is palpable. Eventually Mariam is given in marriage to Rasheed, an older shoe-maker from Kabul, mainly to remove the embarrassment of her very existence from her father’s world. This man is domineering and abusive and Mariam’s inability to conceive causes her to quickly fall out of favor.

The second main character is Laila, a beautiful young girl who grows up as a neighbor of Rasheed and Mariam in Kabul. She has a childhood friend, Tariq, a young man who lost a leg to a Soviet land mine. As these children mature, they fall in love. Tariq’s family decides to run from the warlords who by now bombarding the city. During the hysteria of their pending separation, the two young lovers conceive a child. Once Laila realizes she is pregnant and has no idea how to contact Tariq, she also marries Rasheed and convinces him that the child is his. Needless to say, the relationship between Laila and the forlorn Mariam starts out poorly and gets worse. Eventually they are brought together by their shared victim status and their mutual disgust and hatred for Rasheed. The resolution of the conflict between these two women is riveting and, well, painful. You get the impression that there aren’t too many happy endings in Afghanistan.

While the author tells these two women’s stories, he also gives the reader a fantastic and comprehensive history lesson. The modern history of Afghanistan is complicated and the author uses some of the secondary characters to deliver this lesson. Laila’s father is a school teacher and is very interested in politics and a lot of his dialogue is opinion about the current state of affairs. Laila’s two older brothers fight for one of the warlords against the Communists and are both killed. Rasheed is a businessman who tries to manipulate whatever political system is in charge at the moment, which also gives insight into the political and social climate through all of these regime changes.

This is not an easy book to read. Over and over again, it is heart breaking. The cruelty to women is incomprehensible. The status of medical care during the rule of the Taliban is clinically detailed by the author (who is a physician) and graphically described when Laila presents to the only hospital in Kabul which is allowed to treat women and has to undergo a Caesarean section without anesthesia because the Taliban won’t fund the women’s hospital.

Khaled Hosseini has a writing style reminiscent of Ernest Hemingway. He writes in short, brutal sentences which conjure images that the mind can’t even comprehend. He always uses the perfect word or phrase. He alludes to Hemingway in one section when Laila’s father is reading The Old Man and the Sea. A Thousand Splendid Suns is also a fight against impossible odds, a story of hope when the situation is hopeless, and the resilience of the human spirit.

I think that this book is destined to be a classic. It is critically important for every American who has an opinion about war, freedom and human rights to read this book. It’s easy to forget the citizens of a country as it is repeatedly trampled over the decades. This book puts very real faces on people caught in the crossfire of a conflict they did not initiate. It describes conditions and situations which those of us living in the comfort of 21st century America cannot comprehend. This book is at once entertaining and horrifying, edifying and humbling, compulsively readable and appallingly shocking. It is terrific.

A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini is available in hardcover from Riverhead Books.
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03/17/08

Beth rated it:

Read in April, 2008

Seems that this book and its predecessor, The Kite Runner, has been getting a lot of buzz on the Internet lately — but based on the reviews, I’d shied away from reading either. Most people seemed to agree that these stories of Afghan civil war were “hard” to read — not because of lengthy, erudite descriptions (quite to the contrary, actually; Splendid Suns, at least, was basically well-written with plenty of dialogue to drive the reader through the storyline) but because of the topic. ...more Seems that this book and its predecessor, The Kite Runner, has been getting a lot of buzz on the Internet lately — but based on the reviews, I’d shied away from reading either. Most people seemed to agree that these stories of Afghan civil war were “hard” to read — not because of lengthy, erudite descriptions (quite to the contrary, actually; Splendid Suns, at least, was basically well-written with plenty of dialogue to drive the reader through the storyline) but because of the topic. I suspected that this book was probably filled with graphic descriptions of gore and violence I wouldn’t care to read about.

But when my book club chose this for its pick this go-around, I decided to give it a try; after all, the thing I love best about book club is trying out genres I wouldn’t read otherwise. It didn’t take long to see that the plot would be a series of seemingly endless tragedies, just as I’d suspected. There was a disturbing amount of violence, both on a grand scale through war (which was terrible enough) but also on a domestic, personal level. Worse, I found little hope in this book; even its ending seemed, to me, a case of “too little too late.” If asked to describe the book as a whole, I’d say it was dismal and depressing — and just too graphic for my taste (I found myself skipping entire paragraphs multiple times).

And yet there were a few redeeming qualities about this book that keep me from assigning it the dreaded single star on Goodreads (which, really, shouldn’t be that bad — it just translates to “I didn’t like it.”)

First, I appreciated the insight it gave me into the history of Afghanistan. I love history and learning about new historical events I hadn’t known before, especially on a personal, human level, and A Thousand Splendid Suns delivers here. Hosseini, through his characters, teaches thirty years of Afghan history — something I’d (embarrassingly enough) been basically ignorant of before reading this book.

Second, I came to appreciate my freedoms as an American more deeply that ever before. Reading of the destructive, demoralizing rule of the Taliban was enlightening, to say the least: how women could exist (yes, “existing” would be the word — it hardly seemed like “living” for anybody) in such an oppressive environment was absolutely unreal. Things I thought were basic privileges of modern society — women in the throes of childbirth being treated in decent hospitals, women working to support my family if necessary, women leaving their homes without head-to-toe covering or a male escort — all of these things (which I had counted as inherent rights) were impossibilities under Taliban rule in Afghanistan. The very worst was lack of personal safety — how awful would it be to feel constantly unsafe, unprotected from physical harm, both in and out of your own home. I understand now, as I hadn’t before, how blessed we as Americans are (and me, in particular — I know not everyone feels safe, even in our own country) and how important it is that we fight for freedoms for others who aren’t able to do it for themselves. No one deserves to feel as bound and trapped by a government as these Afghan women did.

So. A book I’d recommend? Probably not. But I book I regret reading? Well, probably not that, either.

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note: I originally gave this book two stars ("it was okay"), but I've decided to change it to a five-star rating simply because I'm tired of being a target for people looking through this book's Goodreads reviews who feel the need to belittle me.(less)

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06/02/07

Jennifer Joelle rated it:

bookshelves: favourites, pocket-books--for-bathtub-reading-

Read in June, 2007

recommends it for: everyone

I must admit that I had some trepidation in starting this novel, along with hope and excitement.

Hosseini's first book, "The Kite Runner" is quite truthfully, one of the best novels I have ever had the pleasure of reading and I can state most elatedly that "A Thousand Splendid Suns" will take it's place amongst those stories that I cherish. I was apprehensive in starting this book simply because I was worried that I would be disappointed; that it would not be cl...more

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02/22/09

Daniel rated it:

(review of isbn 159448385X)

Read in March, 2009

recommended to Daniel by: Rose

It's apparently becoming something of a tradition for me to trash books that are not only widely loved and praised, but were specifically recommended to me by friends. Khaled Hosseini's "A Thousand Splended Suns," I'm sorry to say, is going to get the same treatment. (Forgive me, Rose.) "Splendid Suns" has been so widely read by this point, I won't bother recounting the story, and instead simply list my objections:

- Hosseini seems incapable of creating characters ...more It's apparently becoming something of a tradition for me to trash books that are not only widely loved and praised, but were specifically recommended to me by friends. Khaled Hosseini's "A Thousand Splended Suns," I'm sorry to say, is going to get the same treatment. (Forgive me, Rose.) "Splendid Suns" has been so widely read by this point, I won't bother recounting the story, and instead simply list my objections:

- Hosseini seems incapable of creating characters with much depth to them. E.M. Forster, in "Aspects of the Novel," talks about books having round characters and flat characters, with round one being more like people you'd encounter in the real world, and flat ones being more of caricatures used to move a book's story along. The only character in "Splendid Suns" who approaches roundness, and he's a relatively minor character, is Mariam's father, Jalil. Everyone else is either a villain without any positive traits (Rasheed) or a hero who can do almost no wrong (Laila, Tariq, Mullah Faizullah). Even when Hosseini is depicting a child who has every right to behave badly given his circumstances (Zalmai), he can't help but depict the child as almost evil. The New York Times review of "Splendid Suns" said Hosseini "creates characters who have the simplicity and primary-colored emotions of people in a fairy tale or fable." That's pretty generous of the New York Times. I'd say Hosseini may not be able to create three-dimensional characters.

- While I appreciate Hosseini's attempt to teach a few decades of Afghan history -- a history few readers likely know in much detail -- grafting that history onto the story of one family makes for a rather creaky novel. To impart the history, Hosseini goes back and forth between giving the history through third-person narration, in Wikipedia-like prose, and putting it in his characers' mouths via dialogue -- dialogue often spoken to people who would already know the history. As a result, you sometimes get characters saying things like, "As you know, the Taliban forces men to grow their beards long and women to wear burkas." The cut-and-paste history lessons make the novel painful to read at times.

- Hosseini routinely uses "harami" (bastard) and other words from the characters' native languages in his dialogue, followed by the English translation, apparently in an attempt to bring readers closer to the Afghan culture. But it usually feels incredibly superficial, especially when the words being used aren't foreign concepts, but rather basic words -- "brother," "sister" and the like. Hosseini and his editors also seem to forget about the trope, and cut back on the use of the foreign words in the book's later chapters. I wish they had done the same throughout the book.

- The relationship between Mariam and Laila feels completely artificial. Mariam's initial hate for and jealousy of Laila never feels remotely justified, especially given how awful her husband Rasheed is anyhow, and their coming together later feels rushed and unrealistic. Even after they form a friendship, they never seem to grow quite close enough to fully explain why Laila misses Mariam so much towards the novel's conclusion. Hosseini fails to lay the groundwork needed to justify Laila's emotions in the novel's last chapters.

- Almost the entire book is unrelentingly bleak. Don't get me wrong, I understand Afghanistan wasn't exactly Disneyland over the past few decades, but I think there were more lighthearted moments in the Book of Job than in "Splendid Suns." I don't mind reading a depressing novel, but Jesus. Reading "Splendid Suns," I kept thinking of that old workplace poster: "The beatings will continue until morale improves."

I didn't completely hate "Splendid Suns" -- the story moved along nicely, and it gave me a little more insight into a culture I probably should know more about -- but I don't think I'll be following this one with "The Kite Runner." Khaled Hosseini probably doesn't need me as a reader, though. It seems he has plenty of fans.(less)

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09/14/08

Eastofoz rated it:

recommends it for: Readers looking for a highly emotional soul-ripping read

Another exceptional book by Hosseini. It’ll rip out your heart, have you crying buckets and buckets of tears while marveling at the triumph of the human spirit through severe and virtually unimaginable adversity as well as pure hell.

The writing is absolutely beautiful. The pictures he paints with his words are so vivid that everything from the fun everyday life to the squalor that war brings to the ordinary person just flashes before your eyes like a movie. There are some parts...more

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10/11/07

Gana rated it:

Read in January, 2007

I was disappointed with the quality of this novel after reading his first brilliant novel "Kite Runner". For sure, the story is tragic, painful and unusual for many people, but I don't see the beauty of a novel here; Khaled Hosseini does not sufficiently open internal worlds of his characters; there are not enough descriptions of senses, feelings, thoughts, perceptions and judgments of characters. Events move forcefully and fast: Mariam marries to older man ...she was scared and shudde...more I was disappointed with the quality of this novel after reading his first brilliant novel "Kite Runner". For sure, the story is tragic, painful and unusual for many people, but I don't see the beauty of a novel here; Khaled Hosseini does not sufficiently open internal worlds of his characters; there are not enough descriptions of senses, feelings, thoughts, perceptions and judgments of characters. Events move forcefully and fast: Mariam marries to older man ...she was scared and shuddering first night of sexual intercourse with her husband ... then "somehow" she liked him and later her husband "somehow" becomes colder to her (no any other explanation, except Mariam being not able to produce a child). How their interpersonal chemistry worked throughout marriage, I have no idea. In case of Laila, it is even worse. There is almost zero description about interaction between Mariam and Rasheed; whether her husband was awful for her or she liked being as a little flower for him, I don't know. Only thing I understand is Laila was liked by her husband. In general I feel like Khaled Hosseini retells the afghan women gossip in better way. Believe me, if you just go to Afghanistan and talk to people (if you can communicate), you would easily hear such story.

But I liked some parts of novel, specifically the part how interaction between Mariam and Laila is developing. Interesting part is enemies (Mariam and Laila) come together for survival; to stand against their common enemy - violent husband Rasheed. For Mariam, discovering the gorgeousness of a small girl Aziza was like finding a beautiful flower in the middle of a mud. Khaled Hosseini tells to his readers how far people (even intelligent and gentle women) can go to survive: being forced to commit actions like cheating, lying and even killing. I hope readers did not get impression that every afghan man is cruel and marry to a girl; gets pleasure out of it and women have to survive this. We see in the book at least one person (Mariam's father) feels guilty because of his sin committed in younger age and another person Tariq, marrying to his beloved woman, despite she was married to another man before.
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10/10/07

Abby rated it:

bookshelves: favorites

Has a copy to sell/swap — Read in November, 2007

recommends it for: any one interested in a damn good story

A Thousand Splendid Suns is not a happy book. The lives of the two main characters mirror, internalize and reflect back a metaphor for Afghanistan's brutal, weary, bruised history. Whereas I read The Kite Runner as a retelling of Les Miserables, A Thousand Splendid Suns stands in its own, telling the story of Miriam and Laila, wives of abusive and manipulative Rasheed.

I have a hard time comparing this novel to The Kite Runner and feel that the comparison does a disservice to both ...more

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05/03/07

Melissa rated it:

bookshelves: booksforthegrandparents, literaryfiction

Read in May, 2007

I tore through this book. Literally read it in about eight hours (my day off). It was an entertaining read, and sad, but I wasn't uplifted by it; it lacked profundity. It's not one of the books that I would read again and again. But maybe that's got to do with the fact that I prefer happier stories.

No one will deny that women have always, and continue to, have it hard. Life sucks for women, and it sucks harder if you live in a war-torn, third world country. Mariam is the bastard chi...more

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08/20/08

Philip rated it:

I read A Thousand Splendid Suns having just finished Kite Runner. I would like the opportunity to live life again (who wouldn’t?), if only to have a chance of reversing the order of this experience. I suspect that had I read A Thousand Splendid Suns first then none of the criticisms I raise about the book would even have been imagined, let alone expressed. A Thousand Splendid Suns is a wonderful book, a compelling and gut-wrenching story of two women, Mariam and Laila, who share a husband thro...more I read A Thousand Splendid Suns having just finished Kite Runner. I would like the opportunity to live life again (who wouldn’t?), if only to have a chance of reversing the order of this experience. I suspect that had I read A Thousand Splendid Suns first then none of the criticisms I raise about the book would even have been imagined, let alone expressed. A Thousand Splendid Suns is a wonderful book, a compelling and gut-wrenching story of two women, Mariam and Laila, who share a husband throughout the years of Afghanistan’s tragedy and turmoil. The fact that Khaled Hosseini can sustain expression, narrative, emotion and interest across two novels with ostensibly similar themes in the same territory is testament both to his supreme skill and the depth of the country’s despond.

Where Kite Runner tells the story of two boyhood friends approaching maturity, separating and reuniting, A Thousand Splendid Suns presents two women who are forced together by arrangement. As in Kite Runner, Khaled Hosseini presents ethnic and social class differences as the givens of the story. Similarly, Afghanistan’s turbulent thirty years from the mid-1970s is more than a backdrop: it is the very substance of the idea, eventually revealed as the flesh on the story’s bones, the driving force of circumstance that creates the inevitability of the characters’ fate.

And this is why I wish I could read both books again in the different order, because too often in A Thousand Splendid Suns I felt I had been there before. The backdrop came just too much to the fore, in some parts so much so that I felt Mariam and Laila became puppets of its detail and demands.

That, I suppose, may also be part of the point. Whereas Kite Runner concentrated on male experience, A Thousand Splendid Suns focuses on women and, given what happened in Afghanistan over those decades, it may be that the sense of subservience to the turn of events is the very essence of these women’s experience. Thus, it is almost true to say that they were not, themselves, protagonists. They were done unto.

Mariam and Laila differ in age, ethnicity, birthright and social class. They both, and for different reasons, finish up unhappily married to the same man, Rasheed, older than both combined, brutish, bigoted and sadistic. Rasheed is thus a symbol for the traditional male role without declaring himself as such. In Western terms, we read this “tradition” as misogyny, however, and it is here where I find the book’s weakness. In my opinion – for what it’s worth, and not much at that - A Thousand Splendid Suns would have been an even greater novel had Rasheed been cast as a more liberal figure and had he also suffered as a result of his own conflict with the requirements of changing times. But Khaled Hosseini made A Thousand Splendid Suns from the women’s stories and a more complex role for their husband might have deflected attention from them.

The two women had quite different experiences of youth, and demonstrate quite different capacities to relate to others and even to life, itself. But they have enough in common to need to act together, to need to form a relationship, less than an alliance, more than acquaintance. Pragmatism might have been easier, but the two women develop a real bond, a relationship that shares out the pain, disappointment and unfulfilled dreams of their marital confinement. There is tragedy aplenty and ultimate resolution of a kind.

And then it was the eventual similarity between Kite Runner and A Thousand Splendid Suns that prompted me to take my eye off the ball, to lose a little bit of interest in the story at mid-point. But if this is a criticism then it is an extremely minor one. As I suggested at the start, had I read the two books in the opposite sequence, I would probably have levelled my criticism differently. But having also said in a review of Kite Runner that I would not criticise the book for a lack of explicit position on the politics, I feel that in A Thousand Splendid Suns Khaled Hosseini ought to have said more about the status and role of women. Mariam and Laila live a tragedy, but they are also offered as icons for something bigger, which is women’s position in the society at large. In A Thousand Splendid Suns I thus wanted the author to offer explicit comment on the plight of his characters, at least some general comment, even a dose of polemic to merely label absurdity. Alternatively, as I stated earlier, he could have made Rasheed, their aging husband, a little more complex, a tad more endearing in order to offer a source of the social attitudes without the need to justify them.

But these are all minor points. A Thousand Splendid Suns is, in its own right, another supreme achievement by Khaled Hosseini and a further reminder to all of us that ideology imposed blindly can be a blunt and dangerous instrument.
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04/08/08

Corbin rated it:

bookshelves: fiction

Read in April, 2008

Afghanistan: this crossroads between the East & the West has been crippled by a continuous civil war beginning in the late 1970's. Since then, the ongoing war has caused considerable changes and for all the residents--especially the women in the capital Kabul where much of the violence has taken place.

I looked forward to seeing the changes the female characters were forced into when the Taliban became a stronger politico-religious force in the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, where...more Afghanistan: this crossroads between the East & the West has been crippled by a continuous civil war beginning in the late 1970's. Since then, the ongoing war has caused considerable changes and for all the residents--especially the women in the capital Kabul where much of the violence has taken place.

I looked forward to seeing the changes the female characters were forced into when the Taliban became a stronger politico-religious force in the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, where in the mid-1990's a sort of ethical revolution was spurred. Suddenly, women were no longer allowed to attend schools, have jobs, or be allowed to travel without a male escort. They were forced to cover from head-to-toe, drop their jobs, and were punished severly by their male companions (all which was not originally sanctioned by Islam. Islam was originally a pro-rights religion. Men and women were said to stand as equals--even so far as to have voting rights). **Can you tell I'm a history freak?**

So far it has been particularly fascinating from a historic perspective--I took a course called 'The History of the Modern Middle East' as an elective credit during my senior year at UH, which has helped me to enjoy this book on a higher level than the average reader. However, it would be incorrect to state that it is beyond the grasp of readers. In a way, it is almost Afgan history for dummies, in that the narrators voice, masking as a character, actually explains the events as they unfold.

I would recommend that all readers review the Wikipedia entry on the Afghani civil war (section 3.6). It gives a short background on what exactly is going on chapter-by-chapter. Do be forewarned though, it might take some of the surprise away (being that you will now know what is about to take place).

That being said, let's consider the writing itself: The characters were extremely underdeveloped. It seems as if they are all very much personalities without faces or an qualifying characteristics of real people. Many are emotionally unstable, but I have yet to feel any real empathy, or for that matter, sympathy at all towards them. It is frustrating to be so distanced from them.

My second criticism is that there is a very sporadic and choppy feel to the sections. Years pass and there is a sense that 'ok, I just turned the page and 4 years passed...ok.' I guess the dramatic effect was lost on me.

There was never a definite pull on my part to desperately know what happens next, but I still did not lose interest. I suppose this was to be expected, since the last book I read was so damn good that hardly anything could live up to it (Fingersmith by Sarah Waters if you're curious).

There is a definite sense that Hosseini is trying to pull on his readers heartstrings, and frankly, he failed miserably with me. I think the main reason he failed (miserably, did I say that?) is that he created no real depth or complexity to the characters. I've had no sense of connection to any of them. Plus, the future is just a little too predictable. For instance, it was obvious from the start that something tragic was going to happen to Laila's family. How could the author not kill her parents? They were too progressive, too in the way, the story couldn't move on without them, they were just...characters that needed to die.

If you want tragedy, read Hemingway, read something Russian, watch Jerry Springer for crying out loud, just don't read this.(less)

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12/04/07

Michael added it

This book would bore a stone to tears. I mean, it is really, terribly boring. Toward the end it felt like I was going to go crazy if it wasn't over soon. Like when I tried to read that doorstop "War and Peace", or "Ethan Frome" from high school, or "The Scarlet Letter". Arrrgggghh!

That said, I think this is a good writer, maybe a great writer, and that is why I did finish it. I liked Kite Runner so much. And this one made many of the same points in a slo...more

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11/06/07

LeAnn rated it:

Read in October, 2007

recommends it for: Contemporary fiction readers

I requested A Thousand Splendid Suns from my local library, and after waiting four months, I decided to request The Kite Runner since it was Hosseini's first book. I ended up getting both at the same time, but I listen to TKR in the car while commuting to my daughter's school,so I finished ATSS first. Perhaps that's the right order because several readers on GoodReads have worried that the second novel couldn't compare favorably to the first.

I liked Laila and Maryam's story a lot and...more