Cannonball Read- Book 28

Written by the Vice-President of the publishing company...

When I first picked up the manuscript for The Kite Runner, I knew I had something remarkable in my hands. From the opening pages, I was drawn in by the writing--assured, beautifully descriptive, unfolding at its own pace. Its big thematic concerns--the relationships between fathers and sons, upper class and outcast, loyalty and betrayal--set against a historical background, had an epic feel that seemed rooted in a past century. And yet despite the novel's old-fashioned storytelling, the subject of The Kite Runner couldn't be more relevant today: through the doomed friendship of two boys, we witness the tragic history of Afghanistan in the past thirty years, from the last days of monarchy, to the Soviet invasion, and on to the atrocities of the Taliban.

Beautiful book. I have a new view of the Afghan people. Interesting that I read this as my brother and sister in law prepare for a deployment to this country. I don't want to give anything away. However, I am very sad as to what has become of this country. It is not a country that I learned a lot about in school, but I did learn a lot from this book. It gave me a much better idea of what was going on and what the Taliban have done.

Rating- A