And the Mountains Echoed by Khaled Hosseini

Perhaps the most remarkable achievement of Khaled Hosseini’s story telling is that most – if not all – the dramatis personae exude goodness and love. This was true of his first book, The Kite Runner and it is certainly so of the third I have read – And the Mountain Echoed.

It is a tale that spawns decades and continents. It is a weave of an amazingly constructed web – of separation and reunion, longing and fulfillment, centrifugal and centripetal pulls that cause drifts in opposite directions. Khaled Hosseini is not afraid to scoop up every human emotion and color his canvas with it. He is aiming at your heart and knows how to tug at it, gently but relentlessly.

At the very root is the love of a young brother Abdullah for his little sister Pari, both of a family living in penury in a village in Afghanistan of 1950s. The two are separated early in life and the rest of the story is a collage of many seemingly disparate lives that inhabit France and the US and Greece and Italy and, of course, Afghanistan through its roller-coaster history, and seem to bear barely tenuous six-degrees-of-separation connections. And yet, you hope against hope that somehow a miracle is lying in happy ambush to join dots invisible to the naked eye.

It is a beautiful story, told by a generously loving heart. Recommended!  

A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini

The tale of Mariam and Laila, two Afghan women united by several tragic tosses of the dice, bond of common humanity and, above all, love, is a heartbreaking story. It is also a ride through the contemporary history of Afghanistan, as seen through the eyes of its powerless women.

This is master story telling – a credible tale, simply told. It hurts and uplifts at the same time. The sheer cruelty that we humans – in this case mostly men – are capable of inflicting in the name of misplaced understanding of duty, ideology, politics and, of course, religion is indescribable and so unforgivable. As I read the story, I felt the pain of a decent and warm-hearted people who are caught up in endless cycle of bloodbath. I know that emancipation of women or fostering of human rights is not among the strategic goals of the Western forces currently combating the Taliban, but having read A Thousand Splendid Suns I hope and pray that the Taliban never again return to power in this nation.

It is natural that curiosity and that natural propensity for passing judgements will drive many of us to compare this book with its predecessor offering by Khaled Hosseini. In my opinion, that exercise is neither necessary nor useful. If you were moved by The Kite Runner, be prepared for another emotional roller-coaster ride that is bound to leave you all churned up inside, yet – surprisingly – thrilled and happy.