A Thousand Splendid Suns
list and with four million copies of The Kite Runner shipped, Khaled Hosseini returns with a beautiful, riveting, and haunting novel that confirms his place as one of the most important literary writers today. Propelled by the same superb instinct for storytelling that made The Kite Runner a beloved classic, A Thousand Splendid Suns is at once an incredible chronicle of thirty years of Afghan history and a deeply moving story of family, friendship, faith, and the salvation to be found in love. Born a generation apart and with very different ideas about love and family, Mariam and Laila are two women brought jarringly together by war, by loss and by fate. As they endure the ever escalating dangers around them—in their home as well as in the streets of Kabul—they come to form a bond that makes them both sisters and mother-daughter to each other, and that will ultimately alter the course not just of their own lives but of the next generation. With heart-wrenching power and suspense, Hosseini shows how a woman's love for her family can move her to shocking and heroic acts of self-sacrifice, and that in the end it is love, or even the memory of love, that is often the key to survival. A stunning accomplishment, A Thousand Splendid Suns is a haunting, heartbreaking, compelling story of an unforgiving time, an unlikely friendship, and an indestructible love.
Stats for nerds
2recommend
4mentions
2people
2010–2025years
75% recommend25% neutral
Mentions per year
What Hacker News says
- * A Thousand Splendid Suns
* Foundation and Empire
* On Liberty
* Good to Great
Those books shaped how I interact with other people, which is:
* I will move forward. I am not waiting for you to make a decision. If you need time then it’s on your own time and can catch up at your liability, otherwise it’s absolute empathy and self-sacrifice in all things.
* As for other people I want to avoid people that state firm conclusions lacking evidence or measures. I consider that stupidity but it could just be bias or autism. Either way it’s a problem. If people do that and can’t help but talk about themselves then they are definitely either autistic or a sociopath. If those people are charming then they are definitely sociopaths.
- During the summer I go on holiday to a remote island in the mediterranean where I sit on my patio atop a hill overlooking the sea and read for about a week. The only electronic devices I have are my e-book reader and a charger. Here's some of the best summer reading I've gone through:
The Painted Bird - Jerzy Kosinski - http://www.amazon.com/Painted-Bird-Jerzy-Kosinski/dp/0802134...
A Thousand Splendid Suns - Khaled Hosseini - http://www.amazon.com/Thousand-Splendid-Suns-Khaled-Hosseini...
Brave New World - Aldous Huxley - http://www.amazon.com/Brave-World-P-S-Aldous-Huxley/dp/00617...
Burmese Days - George Orwell - http://www.amazon.com/Burmese-Days-Novel-George-Orwell/dp/01...
The Sun Also Rises - Ernest Hemingway - http://www.amazon.com/Sun-Also-Rises-Ernest-Hemingway/dp/074...
Catch 22 - Joe Heller - http://www.amazon.com/Catch-22-50th-Anniversary-Joseph-Helle...
The Road - Cormac McCarthy - http://www.amazon.com/Road-Oprahs-Book-Club/dp/0307387895
To Kill A Mockingbird - Harper Lee - http://www.amazon.com/Kill-Mockingbird-Harper-Lee/dp/0446310...
The Catcher In The Rye - J.D. Salinger - http://www.amazon.com/Catcher-Rye-J-D-Salinger/dp/0316769487
For Whom the Bell Tolls - Ernest Hemingway - http://www.amazon.com/Whom-Bell-Tolls-Ernest-Hemingway/dp/06...
For non-fiction it really depends on what you're looking for but I really enjoyed Joel Bakan's The Corporation and Mark Thomas' As Used On The Famous Nelson Mandela.
- It's a toss up for me between Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card and A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini.
Ender's Game is one of those books I never got round to reading and I thought it was incredible what they put that boy through. I got the main twist a bit earlier than I should've done but it was such a good story that it didn't affect me too much. I loved the manipulation of political debate by the other children, it reminded me of Fox news for some reason.
A Thousand Splendid Suns is the tale of two Afghan women, one in Kabul and one from outside. It's incredible, harrowing and keeps you in a vice-like grip from start to finish. I loved it so much I bought a copy for my Mother in Law as I kept raving about it. If you liked the Kite Runner then you'll love this (it's by the same author).
- Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut. This was after I finished Casino Royale by Ian Fleming and A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini.
As far as non-fiction goes I'm reading Backgammon by Paul Magriel and Beginning iPhone Development.
