jasonmerrickblvd 's review for:

The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini

3.0

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Needlessly, utterly melodramatic, and littered with cliches- the homophobic villain turned homosexual rapist, the sadistic animus borne by the Taliban, the conditions surrounding Amir' s journey and the closure he receives-in multitudes- are eye roll inducing. But somewhere here there are some interesting ideas that hit close to home. The way that an overpowering emphasis on tradition and culture can fester into environments that are harmful for a society to evolve becomes clear through Hosseini' s depiction of the changing political structure of Afghanastan in the 1980s, and I wish he explored it more. His rhetoric-fueled prose toes the line between compelling historical fiction and monotonous dime store novel, but there's a constancy in the way he ties the journey of his characters back home- this brings up another of the interesting, if not so much original ideas that he explores. It's both a reassuring and scary reminder that one can't escape their past, even if the stakes are raised dramatically for his characters. Hosseini kept me engrossed the entire time, and I feel that ultimately the novel's sincerity and thoughtfulness outweigh its detours into maudlin territory.