The Kite Runner

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Of all the books I have read in the past, The Kite Runner has truly caught my attention. This international bestselling novel was written by the man himself, Khaled Hosseini. Hosseini was born in Kabul, Afghanistan, where he based The Kite Runner and his #1 national bestseller, A Thousand Splendid Suns. After he was born in 1965, Hosseini’s fate was to write this “powerful” yet “haunting” book, as said by the New York Times Book Review. When he was around 11, his family was relocated to Paris by the Foreign Ministry; unfortunately, when they were returning to Kabul in 1980, they had found out about a bloody communist coup and the invasion of the Soviet Army in his country. After graduating high school in 1984, he went on to study medicine, …show more content…

After he had won the annual kite-fighting contest, his servant/best friend, Hassan, had went off to catch the prize of the fallen kite from when Amir had battled and cut it off from his opponent’s kite. Amir went looking for him and caught him getting raped by three boys, who they already knew as the town’s bullies. He doesn’t say anything during and after he witnessed it, when he had cowardly ran off. Since then, his life was full of regrets and constant flashbacks of that evening. Within a few days of what happened, he got Hassan, his servant, kicked out of the house because he hated the feeling of regret in knowing what happened to him. Later, Amir and his father escape to Pakistan from the war, and soon, California. He falls in love with Soraya, marries her before his dad dies from lung cancer, goes back to Kabul to find out Hassan was killed by the Taliban, who spared Hassan’s child Sohrab, goes to look for Sohrab, finds he is held by a Taliban official, who was the one who originally raped Hassan, escapes with Sohrab, adopts him, and in the end, flies a kite with him just as he used to with …show more content…

The Kite Runner is a book I would 100% recommend to anyone who hasn’t read it and I advise to take your time reading because of how captivating and deep it is. Based on only the short summary I have given and because of how unpredictable this book is, why would you wait to read this book? Since it is a historical fiction novel, the author gave important information on the history of Afghanistan, which, unfortunately, its history continues today as the Taliban are still stealing the hope of freedom and safety from the hearts of Afghani citizens. This book is so impactful on today’s society because Americans, especially young gullible Americans like ourselves, fall for the media and scripted news, but we all really need to understand what truly happens overseas. Khaled Hosseini gives us only brief insight into what has happened in Afghanistan, but, sadly, it did not fully explain enough the devastations that go on there that the news misses a lot. Honestly, if you were Amir watching Hassan being raped, or anyone for that matter, what would you have done? I hope you all decide to take The Kite Runner into consideration.Thank

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