Book Tamers| book reviews

Khaled Hosseini’s novel, recently adapted into a film of the same name, has all the ingredients of a bestseller: friendship, betrayal, salvation, exoticism, happy ending. They are all decently mingled with one another; however, there is nothing spectacular, on one hand, and on the other, there are also no illegible clichés.

Strictly referring to what it is told and not how it is told, The Kite Runner is a captivating novel: it takes you in the Afghanistan of the ’70s, calm, monumental, in the America of the immigrants, back into the new Afghanistan taken over by the Taliban, in an incredible rhythm, which sometimes seems to be out of the author’s control. It is an amazing story which leaves out its author, which is autogoverning, which, as in fairytales, is beyond credibility.

Amir, the insecure and coward hero of his own story, has the tone of the one that wants to make up for his mistakes: the fact that he betrayed Hassan, his childhood friend, is a burden that he carries with him all his life, until he finds a way to make it up for it. Also, he strongly wishes that his dad would be pleased with him, both during childhood and after they exile themselves to America. This is the world that Amir gets to know and it doesn’t matter that it is about the Kabul of his childhood, the Afghan community in America or the ruins of the city that he sees years after. Thus, even though the social-political context is mentioned, only history at a smaller scale is emphasized. The manner in which the characters are integrated in history has - nevertheless - a certain searched exotism, defending the occidental reader from too much horror and serving images that he’s already used to by the media.

Up to the end, the cliché can’t be avoided: the cliché is a concentrated form of truth, a sort of an instrument. However, it has to be noticed that the story has enough content to be self told: the character’s reflections and those of the author through the character can’t but disadvantage it.

Up till now, it is clear that the recipe for The Kite Runner is working between some limits: what is most important is the story- this is the most important principle. But for me and my personal way of evaluating a book, educated in the European kind of way, the story can’t be told just like that. If there was some subtlety, Khaled Hosseini would have extended the metaphor of the kites up to the one that could say that Afghanistan is controlled by some other states’ strings. With the help of this subtlety, he would have restrained Amir’s intellectualizations, so unreal in its dullness, too flashy if considering the bad times that he experiences.

In the end, I recommend this novel to those that want to be drawn into a tensioned and touching story, in a world that they got to know watching news on TV or movies. Amateurs that would wish to be thrilled could be dissapointed.

Written by Mihaela