The Kite Runner

by Khaled Hosseini

The #1 New York Times bestselling debut novel that introduced Khaled Hosseini to millions of readers all over the world.

Amir and Hassan are childhood friends in the alleys and orchards of Kabul in the sunny days before the invasion of the Soviet army and Afghanistan’s decent into fanaticism. Both motherless, they grow up as close as brothers, but their fates are to be different. Amir’s father is a wealthy merchant; Hassan’s father is his manservant. Amir belongs to the ruling caste of Pashtuns, Hassan to the despised Hazaras.

This fragile idyll is broken by the mounting ethnic, religious and political tensions that begin to divide Afghanistan further. An unspeakable assault on Hassan by a gang of local boys tears the friends apart; and when the Soviets invade Afghanistan, Amir and his father flee to San Francisco, leaving Hassan and his father to a pitiless fate. Only years later will Amir have an opportunity to redeem himself by returning to Afghanistan to begin to repay the debt long owed to the man who should have been his brother.

Compelling, heartrending and etched with details of a history never before told in fiction, The Kite Runner is a story of the ways in which we’re damned by our moral failures, and of the extravagant cost of redemption.

• ISBN10: 0385660073
• ISBN13: 9780385660075
• Publish Date: 11 May 2004 (first published 1 January 2003)
• Publish Status: Active
• Publish Country: CA
• Imprint: Anchor Canada
• Format: Paperback (US Trade)
• Pages: 400
• Language: English
• URL: https://penguinrandomhouse.ca/books/isbn/9780385660075

Reviews

[nannah]

I'm not even quite sure how to rate this one, so reviewing it is even harder.

Book content warnings:
rape
homophobia
pedophilia

(also above warnings in review)

But I can say with certainty that I would've enjoyed it much more if the author would have just left out the homophobia altogether. The only time same-sex anything was ever mentioned or anything was when the only character who could be considered the villain raped boys.

Maybe people who aren't in the LGBT community won't think anything of it, but for me and others who are? Wow. It's beyond awful to read something like this where we are directly connected to rape and pedophilia. Where our only """representation""" (badly-used term in this book, to be honest) in this book is the villain who is labeled a "sociopath", is part of the Taliban, and who does these shitty crimes.

So I can't really look beyond this, sorry.

The Kite Runner is a sad and beautiful story about the relationship between Hassen, a Hazara servant boy, and Amir, a privileged boy from a wealthy family living in Afghanistan. The book reviews the impact of their relationship 20-30 years later and Amir struggles to fight the demons inside of him and "make himself good again."

This review is going to be brief...

I watched the movie before I read the book, so I had an idea of the plot and twists, but the story itself drew me in as the thread of the past slowly began to unravel and the truth started to come out.Instead of watching actors act on a TV screen, I was reading a haunting book filled with raw emotions. This book was miserable, but it's also optimistic and filled with strong themes such as redemption. Unfortunately, I felt as though I was manipulated into feeling a certain way or believing a certain idea.

The writing style was good, the history, the background of life in Afghanistan was amazing to read about and the book itself was great.

[clq]

Shortly after starting The Kite Runner I mentioned to someone that I had just started reading it. "Ah, I loved the first part of that book.", she said. I replied with "Oh? You didn't like the rest?" and got the answer: "Oh, I did. It's a good book."
It seemed like a strange thing to say at the time. Having now read the book myself, I think I know exactly what she meant.
The Kite Runner is a really good book for many reasons. It has some really beautiful moments, some really uncomfortable moments, and some moments that are just downright gut-punching. The raw and seemingly effortless way in which it conveys happiness, but also sadness, guilt, hopelessness, anger, and pain makes it a really special book.
At the root of it all is the story of a boy from Afghanistan, and the story of his life as he transitions from childhood to adulthood. With that comes a window into a culture, a way of living, and often a way of thinking that is foreign to me. Much of this is extremely interesting, but more importantly it also feels very real, and adds an extra layer to the story itself.
This book has so much going for it, and it is therefore a bit of a pity that I loved only the first part of it. Because, again, there are so many great things in this book. There are quite a few gear-changes in the story, which isn't a problem in itself, but during one of them I think the book loses some of its emotional intensity, and never quite manages to get it back. It goes from being an engrossing emotional story to being a story with plenty of engrossing emotional moments. While the latter is still good it's just not quite the same.
The Kite Runner is a really well done, solid, good, worthwhile read, and I'd recommend it to anyone. I just think it could have been a little bit more.

[clementine]

I really loved the way The Kite Runner started out. The descriptions of Kabul before it was destroyed, the insights into Afghani life (albeit privileged and upperclass Afghani life), and the dynamics between Amir and Hassan, Baba, and Rahim Khan were very compelling. The whole caste hierarchy that left a noticeable and unbridgeable gap between Hassan and Amir would have made for a great book on its own. The rape and the fallout made for a really fantastic beginning.

Amir's life in the United States wasn't as interesting as the first part, but I still enjoyed it. I liked Soraya as a character a lot, and I enjoyed the family dynamics and traditional marriage ritual. Baba grew a lot as a character during that section, and I was still really enjoying the book at that point.

But then Amir went back to Afghanistan, and everything went downhill. It became clear that Hosseini was deliberately trying to create an emotional response from the reader by manufacturing a situation built on unbelievable coincidences. Assef as the very man who Amir had to find in order to save Sohrab? The ~*~symbolic~*~ cut on Amir's lip? The beggar who knew Amir's mother? COME ON. It was also just really, really predictable. As soon as Rahim Khan told Amir about Sohrab, it was painfully obvious that Amir would end up adopting him.

I don't know, I feel like a lot of this book was enjoyable and strong, but the last section with Amir back in Afghanistan just ruined it for me. It was all far too contrived and unbelievable. I think Hosseini is a pretty good writer, but he needs to tone down the emotional content and focus on building a believable story.

[jamiereadthis]

Because I’m always in my habit of reading five things at a time, I closed The Kite Runner after the ending scene, and frowned and thought a bit, and laid it aside and picked up Out Stealing Horses and stumbled over this very passage:

Lars is Lars even though I saw him last when he was ten years old, and now he’s past sixty, and if this had been something in a novel it would have just been irritating. I have in fact done a lot of reading particularly during the last few years, but earlier too, by all means, and I have thought about what I’ve read, and that kind of coincidence seems far-fetched in fiction, in modern novels anyway, and I find it hard to accept. It may be all very well in Dickens, but when you read Dickens you’re reading a long ballad from a vanished world, where everything has to come together in the end like an equation, where the balance of what was once disturbed must be restored so that the gods can smile again. A consolation, maybe, or a protest against a world gone off the rails, but it is not like that any more, my world is not like that, and I have never gone along with those who believe our lives are governed by fate. They whine, they wash their hands and crave pity. I believe we shape our lives ourselves, at any rate I have shaped mine, for what it’s worth, and I take complete responsibility. But of all the places I might have moved to, I had to land up precisely here.

And in one accidental coincidental deft little paragraph, Petterson became my soulmate.

In this case, two stars are meant to say “I liked it well enough, okay, but too many damn contrivances.”

[ibeforem]

This was an interesting book. It gave some history of Afghanistan that I wasn’t really aware of, and a good perspective that fits in with our current times.