Book Review for the month of February: The Kite Runner

Sorry guys, it took me forever to write this!!! Hope you enjoy it and I apologize if there are any mistakes! :)

"The Kite Runner" has won Original Voices Award, Borders Group, and Alex Award and YALSA among many others. Khaleid Housseini, the author is an amazing writer who has a good list of mentionable work published. 

There is nothing more I enjoy than a well written good book to read in my free time. This book is not only well written and captivating, but it gives you so much information about the war in Afghanistan and the rise of Taliban and at the same time the core of the book focuses on love, loyalty, betrayal and redemption. I started reading this book in the plane on my way back to my school, and I just could not put it down until I was done even if it meant I was sobbing on the plane. I know I will not do enough justice to this book, because it is so good that I do not have enough room in this post to write about it. Anyways, here is my weak attempt at reviewing this book that touched me so deeply…

First off, tell me what does loyalty mean to you? How would you feel if your friend would do anything or give up anything for you, and you betrayed him/her? This book, “The Kite Runner” answers those questions and a lot of other questions and leaves you feeling grateful for what you have in life. This book goes from talking about friendship between Hassan, a-low-class-servant Hazara and Amir, who is from a well-to-do family to the fall of monarchy in Afghanistan, to the Soviet invasion and the exodus of the people in the nation to Pakistan and United States and the rise of Taliban. It gives us graphic and haunting images of a man, desperate to feed his children, trying to sell his artificial leg in the market; an adulterous couple stoned to death in a stadium; a colored young boy forced into prostitution, dancing the sort of steps once performed by an organ grinder's monkey.

But to me, this book is mostly about the friendship and the human emotions attached with relationships and how that varies under different circumstances. It warms your heart when you read how close these two kids are despite the class differences they have, and Hassan steals your heart over and over again with his loyalty to Amir. Hassan, who is Amir’s kite runner, says he would eat dirt if Amir asked him to, and when Amir asked him if he would catch the kites for him would say “For you, a thousand times over.” Amir, as much as he loved Hassan could not understand Hassan’s saint-like behavior and his loyalty to him and why his dad favors Hassan over himself which brought out a lot of envy in him. Amir does not step up to heroism and does not save Hassan from the local bullies who rape Hassan and instead tries to get Hassan kicked out of the house out of his guilt. Hassan finally leaves the house and in a way, Amir ruined Hassan’s life and later it is found out that Hassan was Amir’s half-brother and shared the same father. Amir and his dad go to live in the States and Amir tries to redeem himself when he goes to Pakistan to save Sohram (Hassan’s son) who tries to commit suicide when he could not go to the States with Amir.

As I read the book, with tears running down my cheeks in the airplane while the air hostess asked me if I was okay (Yes, it was embarrassing), I could not help wishing I could strangle Amir for being so unfair to such a loyal friend. He is so humanly flawed, and repeats his mistakes and his disloyalty to Hassan when he leaves Sohram in the hands of U.S. aid. Amir finally redeems himself and saves Sohram from Aseef (who is the same person who raped Hassan as a kid) who makes him dress up like a woman and dance and rapes him sometime. He finally adopts Sohram and takes him to U.S. with him but Sohram stays aloof and does not want to talk to anyone. Finally, the book ends as Sohram and Amir fly kites together and Amir volunteers to be Sohram’s kite runner saying “to you a thousand times over…”

HIGHLY HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.

Editor's note: "The Kite Runner" is also available in audio and ebook. Also watch "The Kite Runner" movie. Trailer here! But i suggest you read the book first if you plan to:

Book Review for the month of January:

Here @ कामकुरा .com, we had an awesome idea of bringing you a book review every month (yes, every month! And boy, are we psyched we just met the deadline for this month! :D ). For our first book review, we have come up with the perfect book “Shirish Ko Phool”!!  Enough said!!

Sirish ko Phool

One of the most talked about books in Nepali literature, and my all-time favorite book, Sirish ko Phool makes my heart break every time I read it. Mere thirty-two pages changed the way I perceived of love and made me realize how ironic love can be when a forty-something retired army officer falls in love with a rebellious woman in early twenties who had no interest in him whatsoever. I have read this book over twenty times (no exaggeration), but every time I read it, it leaves me in awe of how Parijat was able to weave such a heart wrenching love story when she herself was unmarried and sick in bed all her life due to paralysis.

“Afno nimti fulnu, afnai nimti fakranu, jharnu jasto euta badhyata lai swikar garna ka nimti bhawara sanga lappa khelnai parchha, jharna ta parchha-parchha bhane bhawara ko chot sahera kina jharne? Afu matra jharne, afno ichhya le jharne." This is what Sakambari (the female protagonist) has to say to the male protagonist (Suyog Bir Singh) when he tells her that flowers bloom so that the bee could suck all the juice out of it to finally let it die. Sakambari, being the headstrong, opinionated and rebellious woman, does not agree to be a subservient to any man, even in that day when all Nepali women did was to cover their bodies in dhotis and stay in the house taking care of the family.

Suyog Bir, on the other hand, a retired army who was incapable of any human emotions was in his mid-forties and “friends” with Sakambari’s brother. This book shows how ironic and helpless love is when Suyog falls in love with the bald and big-mouthed Sakambari, who has no problem calling him a “drunkard” and “old.” He does not understand why he did not fall for Sakambari’s older sister, Mujura, who was the type of girl every Nepali boy would want as a wife; calm, introverted and feminine. He was the person who indulged in drinking and smoking to avoid relationships and we find out that he had a fair share of women in his youth with whom he had slept with. The fact that he fell for the unexpected person at an unexpected time in his life never fails to baffle me and I am sure we can all relate to it at one point in our lives when we finally fall in love.

It makes me proud every time I think of how Sakambari always stood up for herself in those years when women were not supposed to have opinions on anything else except the kitchen. She is a woman us women should look up to, who does not care what the society has to say and who does not believe that women’s purpose in life is determined by the men in her life (father, brother, husband, son). She smoked and did not fear death, she called people out for drinking, and was proud enough to voice her opinions (Kudos to you girl!). This is hard for Suyog to digest, who despises himself for falling for her and almost dying when she leaves to go out of the valley for a month. Unable to control his emotions and out of frustration, he kisses Sakambari when she gets back, who right after that gets sick and eventually dies in less than a month. This leaves everyone wondering what actually killed her and completely heart-broken over Suyog’s ironical life when the only person he had ever loved in his entire life, had been taken away from him.

This novel carries the passion of living a human life, that comes with getting attached to people and falling in love, no matter how much you run away from it and the heartbreak that follows if it is not successful. It beautifully analyzes the psychology of a woman repressed by the circumstances surrounding her, and we never even find out if she had any feelings for Suyog. This book makes you respect love and as much as you want to dislike Suyog for taking advantage of women when he was young, you still cannot help feeling sad for him when he is completely helpless and frustrated out of his love for Sakambari. As a Nepali, I am proud to endorse this book, and I strongly encourage everyone to read it. There is a reason this book was adapted in English to be taught in one of the Universities in the States…trust me!!!

--Moana Kanel

   Hanover, Indiana, USA