DJ Strouse

My Goodreads Review
rating: 2 of 5 stars

The writing in this book deserves 4 stars. The ideas, however, deserve 2, and since I judge books on ideas, the book itself gets 2 stars. I’ll review each aspect of this book separately.

The Writing
This book communicates emotions like none I have encountered before. I assume this book was semiautobiographical because I don’t know how Hosseini could otherwise have charged it with so much emotional character. At times, I felt so affected by this book that I wanted to put it down. I wanted to stop because it was uncomfortable for a book to have such a hold over my emotional state. I won’t give away what those emotions were (for those who haven’t read the book) but I commend Hosseini for his ability to elicit such an experience in a reader.

The Ideas (Spoiler Warning: You may not wanted to read this section if you haven’t yet read the book.)

‘The Kiterunner’ ultimately praises sacrifice and suffering for the sake of others as a highly honorable trait, an assertion that I could barely stomach while reading this book. Hassan occupies the role of hero in this story for the first half of the book, based on his tendency to subject his desires to those of others. Amir attains his own semi-heroic status only by imitating these actions and again sacrificing his own happiness for others.

I find it entirely despairing that suffering and asceticism still play such a prominent role in our moral lives. Life is too often painted in literature as a win/lose game in which wealthy, happy, or successful become so only through the suffering and loss of the poor, unhappy, and unsuccessful.

For readers of this book (or others) dismayed by such notions, fear not! The world is not so! Life can be a win/win game. Happiness does not require suffering and books that perpetuate this moral myth do a great disservice to the world.

For a more uplifting view on happiness, check out Ayn Rand’s The Fountainhead.

View all my reviews.

Tags: No Comments