This is a wonderful, beautiful epic of a novel. Set in Afghanistan and the United States between the 1970s to the present day, it is a heartbreaking tale of a young boy, Amir, and his best friend who are torn apart. This is a classic word-of-mouth novel and is sure to become as universally loved as The God of Small Things and The Glass Palace.
Twelve year old Amir is desperate to win the approval of his father Baba, one of the richest and most respected merchants in Kabul. He has failed to do so through academia or brawn, but the one area where they connect is the annual kite fighting tournament. Amir is determined not just to win the competition but to run the last kite and bring it home triumphantly, to prove to his father that he has the makings of a man. His loyal friend Hassan is the best kite runner that Amir has ever seen, and he promises to help him for Hassan always helps Amir out of trouble. But Hassan is a Shi'a Muslim and this is 1970s Afghanistan. Hassan is taunted and jeered at by Amir's school friends; he is merely a servant living in a shack at the back of Amir's house. So why does Amir feel such envy towards his friend? Then, what happens to Hassan on the afternoon of the tournament is to shatter all their lives, and define their futures.
The Kite Runner of Khaled Hosseini's deeply moving fiction debut is an illiterate Afghan boy with an uncanny instinct for predicting exactly where a downed kite will land. Growing up in the city of Kabul in the early 1970s, Hassan was narrator Amir's closest friend even though the loyal 11-year-old with "a face like a Chinese doll" was the son of Amir's father's servant and a member of Afghanistan's despised Hazara minority. But in 1975, on the day of Kabul's annual kite-fighting tournament, something unspeakable happened between the two boys.
Narrated by Amir, a 40-year-old novelist living in California, The Kite Runner tells the gripping story of a boyhood friendship destroyed by jealousy, fear, and the kind of ruthless evil that transcends mere politics. Running parallel to this personal narrative of loss and redemption is the story of modern Afghanistan and of Amir's equally guilt-ridden relationship with the war-torn city of his birth. The first Afghan novel to be written in English, The Kite Runner begins in the final days of King Zahir Shah's 40-year reign and traces the country's fall from a secluded oasis to a tank-strewn battlefield controlled by the Russians and then the trigger-happy Taliban. When Amir returns to Kabul to rescue Hassan's orphaned child, the personal and the political get tangled together in a plot that is as suspenseful as it is taut with feeling.
The son of an Afghan diplomat whose family received political asylum in the United States in 1980, Hosseini combines the unflinching realism of a war correspondent with the satisfying emotional pull of master storytellers such as Rohinton Mistry. Like the kite that is its central image, the story line of this mesmerizing first novel occasionally dips and seems almost to dive to the ground. But Hosseini ultimately keeps everything airborne until his heartrending conclusion in an American picnic park.
I have seen the novel's name --the Kite Runner many times from the Internet,when it comes to "the novels moved you most".With curiosity,I downloaded it.When reading the novel,from the beginning to the end,I felt a heavy stone of sorrow on my heart.
It is a story about friendship,about fault and atonement,about the good and evil of human natual.
The narrator of the story,Amir ,is born in a rich family.Hassan is his servant as well as close friend.They both lose mother from birth and grow up like brothers.
From Hassan ,I see the most kind and beautiful soul.He never means to hurt anyone.he protects Amir bravely and has a broad mind to endure what Amir do to him.With the promise to run the kite,he hands the last cut kite to Amir though he has insulted by the bully,Assef. for lifetime,he cherishes the friendship,even he dies of protecting Amir's house."For you,a thousand times over"he does as he says…
If Hassan can be described as an angel, then Amir is just a person.when he is a boy,he is badly want father's love and care.he will be jealous,he will fear and be cowardly.When he sees Hassan insulted by Assef,he is so scared that he only hides and watches.he sees what happened but keeps it as a secret.In order to escape the guilt,he makes another fault, making Hassan leave by framing Hassan .Years past, he is still haunted by betraying his childhood friend.
I was shocked when the big secret reveals: Hassan is Amir's half brother,the son of his father and a sevant's wife! Amir's father lives a torturing life,he is torn into two parts.He can't give Hassan the love in the name of a father,which is unfair to Hassan.That explains why he seems care little about Amir …
Knowing the truth,Amir has a painful struggle at the first,and finally chooses the right way,a way of atonement.He rescues Hassan's orphan ,Sorhab,from Assef's hand.At that time,he faces up to Assef's fists,being a man not cowardly.Having gone though a lot of difficulties,he finally brings Sorhab to American.But Sorhab is emotional damaged by adversity.Amir make efforts to revive the little heart.At the end of the story,Sorhab shows a lopside smile,which delights Amir much.Amir run kite for Hassan's son,and says what Hassan once said,"for you, a thousand times over".The snow will be melt,and the spring is coming…The ending is not clearly told,but full of hope.
I like the author' written style.There's paragraghs of internal monologues,warm memorys , sad plots,horrible war scenes…the words,sentences always catch me tightly,make me think,make me cry…Now if someone ask me what novels impressed me most,The Kite Runner will be an answer.
It is the first time I have seen a novel in English.It is hard for me to insist on reading as there are so many words I have to look up.But it really benefit me in some way.
I hate wars which make the world bloody ,cold and cruel, so I do not want to talk about the war. But it is miraculous to see a kite is cut off by another one. And the kite which is cut off flies away like a free bird. Hassan said to Amir that for you, one thousand times over. At first, I tought the friendship between Hassan and Amir was so deep. But then I found that Hassan was a servant in Amir’s home and began to realize it is some kind of loyalty.
Though Hassan always said that Amir treated him as a friend, deep in his mind, he did not put them on the same line. In his eyes, Amir is the person he should look up to and protect, even do whatever he can do to help. Amir was affluence in material, but he did not have friends because of his race. I dislike him because he always ran away when Hassan was hurted by the others in order to protect him. In my opinion, if he stand up fo Hassan, things would have been different. I could not understand why Amir cheated to make Hassan leave at first, though their “friendship” is complicated. Now I come to know that Amir may try to push Hassan out of the position as a servant. And he wished that they stand in the same line and Hassan can chase for the things wanted by himself. Though Amir’s father said that a boy who won’t stand up for himself, becomes a man who won’t stand for anything, Amir finally turned into a brave man who standed up for Sohrab, the son of Hassan.
The kite tied Hassan and Amir tighter tighly. When I saw Hassan running after the kite, I realized that he was chasing for freedom as well. However when I saw Hassan running after the kite, I thought he was learning to protect things he cherished. There are many kites we are willing to have, but do you have the courage to chase for them?