He saves his most lyrical prose for those cherished memories: Even those characters who live elsewhere, or make new lives for themselves, carry within them nightmares or dreams that tie them umbilically to moments, to memories of people and places that forever shape their lives. His characters suffer, by their very origins, being Afghanis, and you cannot imagine that they will survive or emerge scot-free. After all, what he is describing is already disturbing enough without window-dressing. He deals with moments of horror or Sophie’s Choice-type decisions in an almost dry, matter-of-fact manner. Not even the most clinical analyst could remain unmoved by his words. He so tenderly (that is the operative word, I think), movingly and compassionately writes about families and the ties that bind them to each other, that he never fails to evoke in the reader an echoed response. I read it in one sitting over the next 12 hours because I couldn’t put it down – and this is the effect of Hosseini’s writing. I thought it would make me cry, and it did. I knew from having read his other books that Hosseini has a genius for capturing and depicting, in the most pared-down, discreetly poetic words, the poignancy and passion of relationships as well as the horrors of deprivation and separation. I looked at it lying in the heap of to-be-read books like a mousetrap hidden in a shoebox. I knew, when I bought it, that I shouldn’t read it, but probably would. Khaled Hosseini’s latest novel has made me cry and made me miss my family. Who was blown away by the wind one night.”
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