A Thousand Splendid Suns: Khaled Hosseini (Bloomsbury Publishing)

Khaled Hosseini's A Thousand Splendid Suns is a masterpiece that explores the lives of two women, Mariam and Laila, set against the backdrop of Afghanistan's violent history. The book is about the struggles and brutality faced by women. However it also showcases their unyielding strength and capacity for love.Hosseini's writing is vivid and realistic drawing you into the lives of the characters. I was deeply touched by Mariam's life that depicts her sacrifice and acceptance. Laila's strong determination to protect her family is also commendable. The bond between these two women is a testament of resilience of mankind.Afghanistan's history and culture are clearly depicted in the novel. At times it brought me to tears while keeping me on the toe with hope. This book has left a profound impact om me. It left a lasting impression on me about the heart-wrenching lives of women in that country. I would highly recommend this book to anyone who is looking for a deeply emotional and beautifully crafted novel.

I was given this incredible book while I was very ill in hospital for 6 weeks by my mother who told me I needed to read this.I took this book with me everywhere I went for tests in the hospital and all the doctors, nurses, radiography staff told me what an incredible book this was!!I slowly made my way through this book.This book is based in Afghanistan from the 1970’s onwards. It follows the lives predominantly of two women and their phenomenal struggles in a male dominated world.During this period there is so much conflict in Afghanistan too with the Russians and different factions fighting one another.You really get to see how religion and male domination impacts so heavily on women plus living in a war zone all at the same time.You get to see how women’s rights are stripped away. You get to see the brutality of men and how the police and the Taliban see that women have no rights at all. Women are not allowed to escape brutal husbands.You get to see how the Taliban in-force their laws which is brutal.This book has really opened my eyes to the desperate plight of women living in Afghanistan and under the rule of the Taliban.This book has so much love in it too, love of family supporting one another. It’s not all brutality.This book is shocking and loving. The end of the book has a happier ending. I really didn’t want this book to end because I loved the women in this book so much. These women were incredible, strongest women I have ever read about. This book is women caring, supporting one another, how they will give up their own life to protect one another.Living in the West, with so much freedom and rights, it gives you a feeling of having all that stripped away, the loss of identity.I was so incredibly moved by this book, I have bought it for my daughter and will be gifting this to friends too, because it’s a brilliant book, but it’s important to see the plight of women existing in Afghanistan through endless wars, instability, religious laws and male domination.I’m struggling to find a book to read now to possibly match this incredible book. This book is in a class of its own.

Like so many readers I loved this book. Felt deeply for the characters and enjoyed discovering more about Afghanistan. Highly recommended though it is heartbreaking.

Review from my wife, the reader - she said it qas captivating, catching her off guard a few times. Developed characters. Story of love and sacrifice and determination.

As a father of three daughters, I am appalled by how women’s rights are trampled upon in many parts of the world and how we seem to be going backwards, and perhaps nowhere more so than in Afghanistan, the location for this novel.The story is set against that country’s modern history from the 1960s to 2007. The author was made famous by ’The Kite Runner’, and is a wonderful writer. The story is gripping but oh so sad and harrowing. Although it ends on a hopeful note, the return of the Taliban since it was written will have crushed that hope.The book also illustrates how the West seems to have made things worse. When a communist regime takes over, arms are supplied by the West to the Mujahideen to fight the regime even though the new regime was good for women. As the father of one of the protagonists says, “Now is a good time to be a woman in Afghanistan.” The communists enact equal rights for women, introduce universal education for them, and greatly increase their literacy rates.When the communist regime collapses, the Afghans turn on each other in a vicious civil war using the weapons the West supplied and the Russians left behind. As the author notes, "an Afghan’s worst enemy is himself”. That civil war leads to the Taliban taking power, and ultimately 9/11 and the huge loss of life and huge cost of dislodging ( for a while) the Taliban from power. Their oppression of women knew ( and today again, knows) no bounds.The protagonists discover when they need medical help, all hospitals are now just for men, and the only one for women has no medical supplies. Women can’t leave the house without a man, and in legal cases while a man needs only one witness a woman must produce two, which in the case of widespread domestic violence is nigh impossible.And now the West has left, Afghanistan has reverted to the Middle Ages. Women, who had a taste of freedom, are once again trapped in their homes, unable to work even if there is no male breadwinner, and suffocated by their burquas whenever they go out.

This is the best book I have read for a very long time.The horrors the women in the story suffer is truly shocking and yet the story is so uplifting and moving.Just loved it!