A Thousand Splendid Suns - Khaled Hosseini

Anyone who has read Hosseni's first novel, The Kite Runner, will kind of know what to expect from this second helping about Afghanistan and the lives of two women caught up in the events there during many years of conflict and, at times, virtual imprisonment at the hands of their husband. Often whilst reading this, both the subject matter and the novel itself seemed very uncomfortable but it was a highly compelling read nonetheless and one that I enjoyed (though this is not really the right word) far more than I thought I would. It begins with Mariam, the illegitimate child of a successful businessman who spends her early years in a shack on the ...  Read the complete review

Imagine living in a war torn country in which generations have seen nothing else but death and destruction. This book covers three decades of turbulence in war torn Afganistan seen through the eyes of same number of generations living ordinary lives in extraordinary circumstances. Actually women would find this novel easier to understand than the likes of me because the two main characters are women living in a rough tough men's world, their lives are dictated by men folk be it their fathers, brothers or husbands. They live in a world where it is difficult to keep ones dignity and danger lurks over the horizon. Sometimes it is better to read a ...  Read the complete review

** THE STORY ** Set in war-torn Afghanistan, A Thousand Splendid Suns follows the story of Mariam, who is the illegitimate child of a wealthy local businessman. Raised in poverty-stricken surroundings, Mariam and her mother are outcasts, living a lonely and isolated existence. When Mariam is only fifteen, circumstances lead to her father marrying her off to Rasheed, who is thirty years her senior. We soon learn that Rasheed has a very bitter and somewhat volatile aspect to his personality, and because we have by now grown fond of Mariam, this makes the character of Rasheed rather unpopular from the offset. The second part of the book ...  Read the complete review

Set against a backdrop of conflicts in Afghanistan, Khaled Hosseini's second novel 'A Thousand Splendid Suns' is essentially the tale of two women, Mariam and the younger Laila. The blurb tells us that it concerns the friendship, 'as strong as the ties between mother and daughter', that develops between them. It is a while, however, before this friendship starts, and there is a great deal of pain and hardship both before and after its beginning. Part One of the novel, covering a hundred pages, follows the childhood of Mariam. She is the illegitimate daughter of Nana and Jalil, one of the wealthiest men in the city of Herat. Mariam and Nana have been sent out ...  Read the complete review

After reading Khaled Hosseini's first novel, The Kite Runner, I was keen to see if he could achieve the same thing again in his second novel, A Thousand Splendid Suns. This time stepping into a woman's shoes, it tells the story of two women and their marraige to the same man, set against the backdrop of the rise of the Taliban in Afghanistan. The story begins in Afghanistan in the 1970's and introduces us to Mariam, the illegitimate child of a wealthy cinema owner, who lives with her mother in a small hut on the top of a hill. They live a somewhat lonely life, outcast from any kind of community and with Mariam's mother blaming her for the downturn her life has ...  Read the complete review