rE-view: A Thousand Splendid Suns

A Thousand Splendid Suns: A Novel by Khaled Hosseini

My rating: 1 of 5 stars



*This review does contain spoilers*

I want to begin my review by first stating that this was the first audiobook I had ever listened to, and I thought the medium was absolutely astounding. The reader was Atossa Leoni, who I thought did a wonderful job (she was also the female lead in the movie The Kite Runner) and truly brought me into the Afghan world. Her pronunciations of the names and sporadic Farsi (I think it’s Farsi) word were a nice touch that could have been lost in book form, due to my ignorance of the language. I have seen a few reviews in which they say the Farsi was distracting and annoying. Had I read this book in traditional form, I would agree. But Leoni seamlessly patches the English and Farsi together, and I thought it was a nice touch.

That being said, I can’t say I really enjoyed this book. First off, which I believe is a hot issue when discussing this book, is that it was overwhelmingly depressing. Yes, I understand that these sorts of things really did and do happen, but this is a work of fiction. Fiction writers need to understand their responsibility that they are creating works that are not real. To get a certain reaction, a fiction writer needs to take a different route than a non-fiction writer, or even a poet. Had this been a non-fiction account of two women’s lives, I would feel differently about it. But as fiction, A Thousand comes off as sentimental and manipulative. Crushing blow after crushing blow is given to the women and it becomes exhausting and repetitive. Near the end of Laila’s story, when her parents are killed just as they are about to leave, I was broken out of the illusion of the story and became frightfully aware of the work as fiction and a book.

The most of the characters are incredibly one-dimensional, and are simply there to fill certain niches: Laila as the beautiful protagonist, (let’s be honest, Mariam’s story was there to catapult Laila’s) Tariq as the beat-all-odds hero, and Rasheed as the abusive scumball husband. I do think Mariam was a little more than one-dimensional because we get a view of her from a young age, but as an adult she loses some characterization and simply becomes a symbol. Jahlil was at the beginning stages of being fleshed out, but he was only a minor character, and too, became a device to augment Laila’s Disney-style ending.

The book follows in Western ideals, which I found a little disconcerting. I will mention the issue of politics in a second, but I want to begin with the idea of morality. Now, I am certainly no expert on Islamic culture, but I felt there was a distinct aura of “westernization is great!” in the book, and a lack of insight in the ideals that an Islamic culture may have. All of the “good guys” in the book had western ideals: America is great! Education for everyone! Give women rights! Polygamy is bad! Now, personal views aside, I didn’t feel like I could take this book as an accurate account on what the people of this culture really thought. I almost felt like Hosseini was pandering to a western (American) audience, so he put in things he thought they could relate with and agree with.

This segues nicely into the idea of politics put into this story. I think, while being an interesting idea, it was not executed properly. Every section about politics, whether hearing it on the radio, by the narrating voice, or even by the characters themselves seems patchy and self-consciously shoved in. There was also a clear indication of who the “bad guys” were (the communists, the Taliban). Of course Rasheed sympathized with the “bad guys” throughout the story. There was also a lovely view of a America and Western nations, which I actually doubt was the case. Again, I’m no expert so I don’t actually know, but I don’t think Afghanistan ever really looked at America through rose-colored glasses in the way Hosseini portrayed it.

There is a bit more I could talk about, but I think this review is already long enough. Overall, I found the story clichéd, stilted and manipulative. I wouldn’t personally recommend it to anyone, but I can see why it appeals to middle-class Americans. I do commend Hosseini for trying to include so many things in one novel, but I do not think he executed it properly. Also: nearly three references to the title randomly planted in, looking like an eyesore? Yikes.

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