A Thousand Splendid Suns
by Khaled Hosseini
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Book Reviews of A Thousand Splendid Suns
Book Review: radiance of a thousand splendid suns in a woman's heart....
Summary: 5 Stars
Yes , I just finished Khaled Hosseini's second masterpiece and I am at cross roads of trying to pen down what the pages made me think and feel. Interestingly, I still haven't completed the Kite Runner but this one, I couldn't put down for a second. The first thing that strikes you about the book is the fact that it is the story of the lives of 2 women amidst a battered Afghanistan, spanning several decades, but more importantly, it is a story written by a man, completely from a woman's perspective. This is even more striking when you realize that this is the same author who made his readers' eyes sting with the accounts of "Baba Jaan" in the Kite Runner.
I am in no way qualified to critique this masterpiece but I don't want to lose the essence that it left me in me today. As one reads the book, one is made brutally aware of the atrocities that are lashed out on women in different levels of society in different ways. One feels a sense of revulsion towards fundamentalism in all its forms. One is apalled at how close to truth, some of these pages probably are. Yes, the storyline speaks to one geographical area and one socio-political community, and yet as I went through the pages, the paragraphs that left my face moist with tears were not the ones that shouted atrocities, rather the ones that would resonate with any woman today, in any part of the world, in any community, in any faith.
Whether it was the unshed tears of an incomplete love story, or the sorrow of a woman to lose her child even before the little one made an appearence in this world; whether it was the joy of the same woman to find opportunities where she could be a mother in ways that completed her very existence without ever giving birth; whether it was that friend who would kill for you; that friend who would die so you could live your dreams; at the end of the day this was a story of the best and worst facets of human relationships. No one is without frailties, least of all a woman, and yet what makes you look in awe at the 2 principal characters in the book is their very imperfection; their inability to probably fight their circumstances and yet their ability to be the best they can be.
Anthologies have been written through history about the "fairer sex", the "weaker gender", the "opressed lot" etc. Both literate and educated women all over the world have stood up to fight for their sisters, for the wrong and right causes, with the wrong and right means. Repetition of what women have to go through seems as pointless as meaningless. This book inspires at a very different level. It makes you look at reality head on, makes you lock eyes with the most brutal beast that can get you down, some call it fate, some call it circumstances, I call it my reflection in my mirror. You truly are your own worst enemy if you let that reflection determine your image rather than the other way around.
Laila and Mariam - the 2 principal characters in the book, didn't live, they merely existed, but somehow in all that they went through, their spirit shone with a radiance that can only be a gift of the Divine. Yes, they are characters from a work of fiction, but as I started to look around me, I realized I have the privilege of knowing a lot of women who may not suffer the physical adversities that Laila and Mariam did, but mentally they could have been reduced to a shell of a human being. Yet these women not only survived but have done so with pride, dignity, with their heads held high. We call them by different names, mothers, sisters, friends, aunts, grandmothers etc. They each had a cross to bear, and for some reason it was not a burden, rather a gift from Above.
Look around you, there are women whose faces remain hidden either behind make up or smiles, behind twinkling eyes or an infectious laugh... and if you looked really closely, you would find, they cry a silent tear when no one is looking, they sigh wistfully when no one is around, they wonder about their "what-ifs" in a moment of solitude, and yet when life takes over, they shine with the brilliance of a thousand splendid suns....
Book Review: The Sins of the Fathers Are Visited on Everyone
Summary: 5 Stars
A THOUSAND SPLENDID SUNS tells the wonderful, intensely moving story of how two modern Afghan women overcome the great challenges that have faced women in Afghanistan and rise above their victimization. Khaled Hosseini has succeeded in capturing many important historical and contemporary themes in a way that will make your heart ache again and again. Why will your reaction be so strong? It's because you'll identify closely with the suffering of almost all the characters, a reaction that's very rare to a modern novel.
In Part One, you meet Miriam at age five as she learns that she is a harami (an illegitimate child). Miriam's wealthy father, Jalil, had seduced a housekeeper, Miriam's mother, Nana, six years earlier and now provides for both of them in a remote shack where he can keep a low profile. Despite his concern about his reputation, Jalil adores the attention that Miriam devotes to him. All proceeds in an artificial and harsh way until one day Miriam decides to demand her father's attention. The consequences shape her world for the rest of her life.
In Part Two, the story moves to focus on Laila, who was born to Miriam's acquaintance Fariba at the end of Part One. Laila's rearing is almost totally the opposite of Miriam's. Laila is loved by both her parents with whom she lives and has many chances to develop her knowledge and skills. Laila lives in Kabul while Miriam grew up in the countryside outside of Herat. Laila is beautiful while Miriam is plainer. They also grow up in different times: Miriam is old enough to be Laila's mother. Miriam never had a male friend while growing up, while Laila is fascinated by the one-legged Tariq. All is going well for Laila until the war intrudes to send her life off into an unexpected direction.
In Part Three, the two women begin to share a destiny and develop a relationship. Their lives are more fundamentally changed by this relationship than by anything else that has happened to them. The magic of the story is most evident in Part Three.
In Part Four, we come into the present, when Afghanistan is once again opening itself to possibilities.
The time span of the book is from 1964 to the present. In the background, you are kept up-to-date on political events that shake the entire country. In some cases, those political events turn into revolutions and wars. In many cases, the violence intrudes into the lives of the book's characters. It's like reading War and Peace as adapted to modern Afghanistan.
The book also deals with issues of class, religion, sexual roles, child rearing, work, education, and community. These issues are highlighted in terms of the different regimes and attitudes of the controlling male characters. For Afghanistan was a world where the men called the shots, unless they chose not to do so. Although the issues that are raised and the way that they are raised are pretty predictable, it's a tribute to Mr. Hosseini that you won't see them coming. He moves his characters and action around in such a way that you won't see much foreshadowing of what's to come. Part of that skill comes in making each page so interesting and engaging that you are pulled away from thoughts like "I wonder where he's going next with this plot." I found myself deeply inside the story throughout. That's rare for me, especially in a story that focuses on female characters.
A THOUSAND SPLENDID SUNS was one of the very top novels of 2007.
I highly recommend this book and encourage you to discuss it with your friends. This novel would be a great choice for your book club.
Book Review: Women Fiction Club Book Review
Summary: 4 Stars
In keeping with the true meaning of women's fiction, A Thousand Splendid Suns was selected and read by Women Fiction Club members because it actually fits the genre. This title 1) focuses on a woman (in this case women), 2) the women learn, change and grow because of a journey detailed within the pages of the book and 3) the book has a satisfying but not necessarily tidy and happy ending. There may also be added benefit for readers of this book. When following Miriam and Laila, the two heroines in the novel, readers may discover that they have also learned, changed and grown in knowledge and perspective by the end of this book.
The setting for the book is Afghanistan from around 1959 to April 2003. The very volatile happenings in the country are such an intricate part of the book that they heavily influence each character's personality in ways not easily imagined. Those who are not familiar with Afghanistan's past may be intrigued enough to do their own historical research for a better understanding and clarification. It would be an interesting side project, especially for book club discussions, but it's certainly not necessary to enjoy the book or respond to its characters.
Miriam, the illegitimate daughter of a very rich married man, lives in exile with her mother Nana, who is a very bitter, unhappy and angry woman. Nana teeters between blaming her predicament on Jalil, the man who fathered her child and Miriam, the child born from their illicit affair. Although Jalil already has three wives and multiple children, Miriam and her mother are an embarrassment for the family. Not only is Miriam a harami (bastard) but her mother worked as a maid in Jalil's home when she became pregnant. The book gives life to Miriam's story of her solitary upbringing until age fifteen when she is married off under stressful circumstances to Rasheed, a man well into his forties.
Laila, is born years after Miriam's marriage takes place. The contrast between the two women is more than the generation that separates them. Their childhood beginnings have stark differences which have molded their personalities and outlooks. Laila has had valuable relationships with her parents, friends and the community which allows her to blossom into a very proud and independent teenager. However, Laila, at age fourteen, also marries Rasheed. Like Miriam, the circumstances surrounding the marriage are very difficult and Laila feels as if she has no choice.
The two women, who come from very different experiences, have nothing in common but the one man that they both married. Once neighbors, Miriam and Laila must share a life together under the same roof with the same abusive husband. In their roles as wives they start out as adversaries but eventually they create an important bond. They discover that the difficulties they endure living under the Taliban's rule and in the midst of war is about more than learning how to be family or friends - it's about how to survive.
The general consensus from The Women's Fiction Club members is that this book is a WFC favorite!
Title - A Thousand Splendid Suns
Author - Khaled Hosseini author of The Kite Runner
**The Women's Fiction Club is on Facebook
Book Review: Something was off
Summary: 3 Stars
I am never one to complain about anything at all, ever. But in all honesty, the book was NOT as described. I believe when I reviewed the listing for the book, it was described as 'in very good' condition. I was expecting the book to have been read, to have maybe a few creases in the spine, maybe the corners upturned a bit, but to be otherwise fine. This book was in terrible condition. There is no way that it could be described as 'very good condition'. It looked like it came from a library, like hundreds of people have read it before it came to me. The front of the book had been bent in places, ALL of the corners of the front and back cover were bent (if they existed at all), there were many many creases in the spine and it appears that numerous liquids have been spilled throughout the paged. The front conver was even ripid in a couple of places, and all the pages were in a permanant position as if someone had thumbed through them relentlessly top and bottom. I was very displeased because the item was described as having been in 'very good' condition, when the poster probably shouold have listed it as 'hey, it's legible'. I hate to complain and am usually very happy with the items that I reveive, but I feel that the seller completely misprepresented the condition of the book. I am farily certain that my book spent years in a public library before it came to me. I was very disappointed. I usually like to give second chances but I doubt that i will ever buy a thing from this seller again, unles they learn to sell books as described. I would have happily paid the same prive for a book that was in poor condition. I was a great book and I loved it, but I just feel as though I were lied to a little bit. Sorry ro be rude. I enjoyed the book thoroughly anyway, so ultimately it was worth what I paid. I just wish that the seller would have been a but more honest with me, because believe me, there is no way that anyone could bpssibly construe this book I received as 'in very good condition. Sorry but I don't think that I will return to this seller in the future, although I am sure that this was a mistake and doesn't happen too often. Also the length of time it took to get here seemed excessive to me, I believe I was waiting for it for a week and a half, and that it was not shipped out within two business days. But perhaps that is my fault for chosing standard shipping. Thank you for your tine. I am sure that the seller is generally competent and reliable, so don't base your decisions on what I have said if you are considering from tihs seller.
Thank you for your time, and once again I am sorry for the complaint or if I offended anyone. I just hope that maybe better attention should be given to the condition of the books and the way that you portray them before they go out. Maky sure if someone ordered a book in very good condition that it IS in good, or at least decent condition- not one that has been thumbed through a million times by a million different people.
Book Review: A powerful story of female life in 20th century Afghanistan!
Summary: 5 Stars
Long before Mariam was capable of even understanding the concept, she knew she was a "harami"- illegitimate and unwanted. Her impoverished, embittered mother, rejected by the wealthy Afghani business man who had fathered Mariam, spirals downward from disgust and hatred through mental illness to an eventual suicide. She spits the cruel, pejorative label into Mariam's face at every opportunity. Her sole remaining purpose in life is to have Mariam join her in the crushing belief that there is no future, no pleasure, no value, no life and no meaning to being a woman in the male-dominated culture of war-torn 20th century Afghanistan.
At age 15, Mariam makes an impetuous overture to the father she is convinced loves her in a way her mother simply doesn't understand and sadly discovers that her mother was right all along. Her father summarily pushes her out of his life and away from his legitimate family by arranging her marriage to Rasheed, a 40 year old shoemaker, who treats her exactly as Mariam's mother might have predicted. Physical abuse, beatings, sexual assault, intimidation and virtually complete isolation become the hallmarks of a dutiful Mariam's dreadfully unhappy marriage for the next twenty years.
At age 60, Rasheed takes a second wife - Laila, a 14 year old child-woman, separated from Tariq, the young man that she loved and orphaned by the civil war bombs of the bickering Mujahideen warlords. After an impossibly short period of initial infatuation with his new young bride, Rasheed's incorrigible violent misogyny re-surfaces and Laila faces the same daily litany of abuse that Mariam has already known for over twenty years.
"A Thousand Splendid Suns" is the gripping, emotionally powerful story of Mariam's and Laila's life together in the wreckage of Kabul, the impoverished Afghanistan city bloodied by years of external war with the Soviets, scarred by civil war among the Mujahideen lords and repressed by the religious intolerance and domination of the Islamic extremists that form the Taliban regime. "A Thousand Splendid Suns" is a novel that nobody will find pretty or comfortable to read. But it is a stirring tale of the sacrifices of two women, their love for their children and the awesome strength and support they give to one another in their refusal to bend and break in the hurricane of diversity that seeks to destroy them.
It's also a very politically charged book that will have both hawks and doves questioning their position as to whether western participation in the Afghani struggles is right or wrong! There are no blacks or whites in this choice ... only an endless morass of muddy shades of dingy grey!
Simply put, Khaled Hosseini has written a magnificent gut-wrenching, heartbreaking novel that will move even the most hard-hearted readers to tears. More than recommended, this is a novel you must not miss!
Paul Weiss