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A review by morgob
The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini
5.0
This book was heartbreaking. It is quite a heavy book to read, but that doesn't make it any less enjoyable. I know from reading others' reviews that some people think this book is predictable and full of cliches, but I respectfully disagree with most of that. Sure, there are some parts of the book that are predictable, but there are also lots of parts that took me completely by surprise. I think this is a good novel to sort of portray the political upheaval in Afghanistan. There is something about reading a book where the character watches as their country that they once loved falls apart before them. For this book, it was more that he left his country and then came back to it many years later to find that it had been destroyed. He couldn't find any similarities between his memories and what was in front of his eyes.
People also claim that the main character is unlikable. I also disagree with that. Some people believe, although they may not admit it, that the type of character they look for to enjoy is one without major faults and flaws, and one that they can live with inside their head. Sometimes that is what happens when you read; you get inside the main character's head and live their life through them. That is not the case with Amir. He makes many mistakes. For a while, yes, you could consider him to be a "bad" person. It is difficult to "live" in his head with the decisions he made. But at the same time, that made him all the more real. He realizes that he made mistakes but he still couldn't do anything to change them. He also, eventually, realizes the privilege he grew up with and recognizes that in his head the differences between how he lived and how other boys lived at the time. And yes, ultimately, he kind of pays for his mistakes, if you will.
I really enjoyed this book and learned a lot from it. There were parts that were hard to stomach, but I forced myself to read through them. Just because something is difficult to read doesn't make it bad, it just means your heart is still working. If I had to compare this book to another, I would say Shantaram. There are many similarities that I kept thinking of: the best friend of the main character, who kind of doesn't deserve a friend like him, who ends up suffering and not living the life he should have, the pain of the main character at losing so many people he cares about, the country in ruin and turmoil because of various reasons, the violence done to the main character which he feels he deserves, and just in general a heavy feeling of a full life that was lived. That probably doesn't make much sense, but I did keep thinking of that book as I read. I wanted to cry after finishing this book, both of sadness and happiness, but I finished it at work so I could not.
People also claim that the main character is unlikable. I also disagree with that. Some people believe, although they may not admit it, that the type of character they look for to enjoy is one without major faults and flaws, and one that they can live with inside their head. Sometimes that is what happens when you read; you get inside the main character's head and live their life through them. That is not the case with Amir. He makes many mistakes. For a while, yes, you could consider him to be a "bad" person. It is difficult to "live" in his head with the decisions he made. But at the same time, that made him all the more real. He realizes that he made mistakes but he still couldn't do anything to change them. He also, eventually, realizes the privilege he grew up with and recognizes that in his head the differences between how he lived and how other boys lived at the time. And yes, ultimately, he kind of pays for his mistakes, if you will.
I really enjoyed this book and learned a lot from it. There were parts that were hard to stomach, but I forced myself to read through them. Just because something is difficult to read doesn't make it bad, it just means your heart is still working. If I had to compare this book to another, I would say Shantaram. There are many similarities that I kept thinking of: the best friend of the main character, who kind of doesn't deserve a friend like him, who ends up suffering and not living the life he should have, the pain of the main character at losing so many people he cares about, the country in ruin and turmoil because of various reasons, the violence done to the main character which he feels he deserves, and just in general a heavy feeling of a full life that was lived. That probably doesn't make much sense, but I did keep thinking of that book as I read. I wanted to cry after finishing this book, both of sadness and happiness, but I finished it at work so I could not.