A Thousand Splendid Suns

Beautiful. Beautiful. Beautiful. 
My hands trembled as I read this touching, heart-wrenching and so very realistic dark tale of two generations of women that despite being trapped in a loveless marriage still dare to fight for love and life. Believe me, by the time you get to the middle of this book you won't be able to put it down.
I noticed how sheltered and comfortable my little life is and how I complain so much about such petty things like "internet not working" or "not staying with a guy last time I went out clubbing" and such stupid things of the sort while these two women had to marry against their will, endure humiliation and hardship, having to bear, bed and  care for a madman husband and worst of all be considered and treated like a creature of less value than an animal. Horrid!
Even though this was a fiction book its nonetheless a very real story. The writer, Khaled Hosseini managed to give me another glimpse of a world that we know little about but frequently condemn and discard. He wrote a majestic, sweeping, emotionally powerful story that provided me with a most telling window into Afgan society over the past thirty-odd years. It's also a moving story of friendship and sacrifice in which I got a rare peek into the suffering and mistreatment of Afghan women that began long before the Taliban came to power.
What spoke out the most to me in this story is how it speaks so tenderly about the fragile beauty of love and devotion and lasting impression people make on people. As I delved into the pages of this book I thought about my life and how much I really value people and what's my impression on their lives. 
In many ways this was a sad book, and my heart went out to these two women in their hopeless struggle to have a decent life with a brutal man in an unforgiving, intolerant society. It's a bittersweet end but one that I couldn't find a better ending for.


And for last, the book review:


Afghan-American novelist Hosseini follows up his bestselling The Kite Runner with another searing epic of Afghanistan in turmoil. The story covers three decades of anti-Soviet jihad, civil war and Taliban tyranny through the lives of two women. Mariam is the scorned illegitimate daughter of a wealthy businessman, forced at age 15 into marrying the 40-year-old Rasheed, who grows increasingly brutal as she fails to produce a child. Eighteen later, Rasheed takes another wife, 14-year-old Laila, a smart and spirited girl whose only other options, after her parents are killed by rocket fire, are prostitution or starvation. Against a backdrop of unending war, Mariam and Laila become allies in an asymmetrical battle with Rasheed, whose violent misogyny—"There was no cursing, no screaming, no pleading, no surprised yelps, only the systematic business of beating and being beaten"—is endorsed by custom and law. Hosseini gives a forceful but nuanced portrait of a patriarchal despotism where women are agonizingly dependent on fathers, husbands and especially sons, the bearing of male children being their sole path to social status. His tale is a powerful, harrowing depiction of Afghanistan, but also a lyrical evocation of the lives and enduring hopes of its resilient characters.