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The Kite Runner

ebook
1 of 9 copies available
1 of 9 copies available
The #1 New York Times bestselling debut novel that introduced Khaled Hosseini to millions of readers all over the world.
Amir and Hassan are childhood friends in the alleys and orchards of Kabul in the sunny days before the invasion of the Soviet army and Afghanistan’s decent into fanaticism. Both motherless, they grow up as close as brothers, but their fates are to be different. Amir’s father is a wealthy merchant; Hassan’s father is his manservant. Amir belongs to the ruling caste of Pashtuns, Hassan to the despised Hazaras.
This fragile idyll is broken by the mounting ethnic, religious and political tensions that begin to divide Afghanistan further. An unspeakable assault on Hassan by a gang of local boys tears the friends apart; and when the Soviets invade Afghanistan, Amir and his father flee to San Francisco, leaving Hassan and his father to a pitiless fate. Only years later will Amir have an opportunity to redeem himself by returning to Afghanistan to begin to repay the debt long owed to the man who should have been his brother.
Compelling, heartrending and etched with details of a history never before told in fiction, The Kite Runner is a story of the ways in which we’re damned by our moral failures, and of the extravagant cost of redemption.
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    • Publisher's Weekly

      Starred review from May 12, 2003
      Hosseini's stunning debut novel starts as an eloquent Afghan version of the American immigrant experience in the late 20th century, but betrayal and redemption come to the forefront when the narrator, a writer, returns to his ravaged homeland to rescue the son of his childhood friend after the boy's parents are shot during the Taliban takeover in the mid '90s. Amir, the son of a well-to-do Kabul merchant, is the first-person narrator, who marries, moves to California and becomes a successful novelist. But he remains haunted by a childhood incident in which he betrayed the trust of his best friend, a Hazara boy named Hassan, who receives a brutal beating from some local bullies. After establishing himself in America, Amir learns that the Taliban have murdered Hassan and his wife, raising questions about the fate of his son, Sohrab. Spurred on by childhood guilt, Amir makes the difficult journey to Kabul, only to learn the boy has been enslaved by a former childhood bully who has become a prominent Taliban official. The price Amir must pay to recover the boy is just one of several brilliant, startling plot twists that make this book memorable both as a political chronicle and a deeply personal tale about how childhood choices affect our adult lives. The character studies alone would make this a noteworthy debut, from the portrait of the sensitive, insecure Amir to the multilayered development of his father, Baba, whose sacrifices and scandalous behavior are fully revealed only when Amir returns to Afghanistan and learns the true nature of his relationship to Hassan. Add an incisive, perceptive examination of recent Afghan history and its ramifications in both America and the Middle East, and the result is a complete work of literature that succeeds in exploring the culture of a previously obscure nation that has become a pivot point in the global politics of the new millennium. (June 2)Forecast:It is rare that a book is at once so timely and of such high literary quality. Though Afghanistan is now on the media back burner, its fate is still of major interest and may become even more so as the U.S.'s nation-building efforts are scrutinized. 10-city author tour; foreign rights sold in Canada, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Holland, Israel, Spain, Sweden and the U.K.

    • Publisher's Weekly

      September 26, 2011
      Seven years after the novel’s publication and four years after the release of a motion picture, a faithful though streamlined graphic novel adaptation of Hosseini’s bestseller appears. Amir was raised in privilege in Afghanistan, with Hassan, a member of the Hazara minority whose father is a servant in Amir’s house, as his constant companion. Amir’s jealousy over his father’s affection for Hassan leads to a betrayal that breaks up the friendship. Hassan and his father move away, Amir and his father escape from Afghanistan during the Soviet war, and the tie seems broken forever. But 15 years later, Amir, now living in San Francisco, receives a call that sends him back to Afghanistan and straight into the heart of the darkest part of his history. The characters are strong-featured (though Hassan’s cleft pallet, significant in the story, is all but invisible) and expressive, though murky coloring sometimes threatens to obscure linework. The art during Amir’s recounting of his Afghan childhood is bathed in warm colors, contrasting well with the gray, muted colors of Afghanistan during Taliban rule. In a conflict that we now know has no easy solutions, a happy ending, while welcome, feels like nothing more than wishful thinking.

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  • OverDrive Read
  • EPUB ebook

subjects

Languages

  • English

Levels

  • ATOS Level:5.2
  • Lexile® Measure:840
  • Interest Level:9-12(UG)
  • Text Difficulty:4-5

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