Summaries and Customer Reviews are supplied by Amazon.com

AFTER MORE THAN TWO YEARS ON THE BESTSELLER LISTS, KHALED HOSSEINI RETURNS WITH A BEAUTIFUL, RIVETING, AND HAUNTING NOVEL OF ENORMOUS CONTEMPORARY RELEVANCE.

A Thousand Splendid Suns is a breathtaking story set against the volatile events of Afghanistan's last thirty years -- from the Soviet invasion to the reign of the Taliban to post-Taliban rebuilding -- that puts the violence, fear, hope and faith of this country in intimate, human terms. It is a tale of two generations of characters brought jarringly together by the tragic sweep of war, where personal lives -- the struggle to survive, raise a family, find happiness -- are inextricable from the history playing out around them.

Propelled by the same storytelling instinct that made The Kite Runner a beloved classic, A Thousand Splendid Suns is at once a remarkable chronicle of three decades of Afghan history and a deeply moving account of family and friendship. It is a striking, heartwrenching novel of an unforgiving time, an unlikely friendship, and an indestructible love -- a stunning accomplishment.

Average Customer Rating:

A sad burqa "romance" with a semi-happy ending

Customer Rating:

I enjoyed the book. Despite having a mostly sad story line, the two female main characters demonstrated courage, love, and hope in an otherwise brutal and oppressive marriage. This book is not for children since it frequently describes sexual encounters in a somewhat graphic, though tasteful, manner. No need to recount the story since other reviewers have already done that. I'll just express some thoughts that occurred to me as I read the book: 1) The book describes at least two lines of Islamic thought. One is the oppressive, brutal Taliban variety that treats women harshly, prohibits them from study or work, and views them as male property. The other is a more open minded, progressive variety that encourages women to learn and work. The author clearly prefers the progressive variety. The story shows the danger of having zealots in control of a country. We're truly fortunate to be in a country where one ideology or religion does not control us, particularly an oppressive ideology like the Talibans. 2) The story has two women who grew up without having to wear burqas, marrying a man of the repressive variety who required them to wear a burqa in public. Having lived in Afghanistan for several months, this brought back memories of the women wearing burqas, how uncomfortable they seemed, and the double standard. It reminded me of a time at a lake near San Antonio where I saw three Muslim women sitting on the beach in direct summer sun (very hot) wearing black abayas, waiting and watching while their husbands wearing swim shorts and no shirt played in the water with the kids. It escapes me how some Muslim men don't see how cruel and unfair this double standard is. They claim the cover is for purity, yet if that were true the males would have to cover themselves as well to maintain their purity. Yet, nowhere do we see male burqas or abayas. 3) Most of the story line was about a brutal wife beater. For the wife abusers, the burqa is a great way to conceal bruises. 4) Women under the Taliban had no rights and that is true in many middle eastern cultures still. I'm glad our western cultures got past the "women as chattel" concept. We can only hope the Afghan culture and the rest of the middle east will wake up and stop oppressing half their populations. 5) The Taliban sense of justice is truly warped. In the story, a husband beats a woman, another woman tries to stop him from doing that and ends up killing him to protect both their lives....so the Taliban sentence HER to death because women have no right to disobey their husbands. Scary. Although this story is fiction, it is based on reality. 6) The book reminded me of a Japanese-made film about the life of a woman and her daughter struggling to live under the Taliban. Saw it in Kabul but can't remember the name. Very powerful and depressing movie. It brings the evilness of the Taliban into crystal clear focus, as does this book. 7) The father of one of the women had ostracised her because she was a "harami" (bastard child of his). He refused to acknowledge her and instead married her off to a brutal man far away. At the end, he attempts to gain forgiveness, but it's too late. Made me think of the importance of caring for our children and ensuring they know we love them. 8) The tension that exists in Afghan culture between arranged marriages and marriages desired by both parties is shown. Another example of how the culture is behind the times and inconsiderate of the feelings of people wanting marriage. Too often, the reality there is that a young woman is married off to an old guy that she finds repulsive and, well, old...and often she knows a young man she finds attractive, yet is unable to marry. 9) The ending was powerful with Laila going to the birthplace of her deceased co-wife to honor her and feel connection to the woman.

Overwhelming

Customer Rating:

I first listened to CD's of this book on a very long and boring car trip. Of course I had already read and immensely enjoyed The Kite Runner. Well, this is even better, although somewhat more harrowing. It shares the same elegance of writing style, surprising, when one considers that English is not Hosseini's first language. The local color of Afghanistan is fascinating, but more interesting yet is the detail of injustices to women that is so unlike that which exists in Western society. Even though the book is, I presume, fiction, there is nothing self-serving or deliberately sensational about it. To say it is merely a good read is to do it a dis-service. Marvellous!

Amazingly told...a must read!

Customer Rating:

A Thousand Splendid Suns is a better book than the kite runner in my opinion. The pages exude genuine feeling...it is amazing how the author captures the full sentiments of betrayal with his candid descriptions. This is the heartbreaking tale of two womem, both struggling to find their way in a world that seems bent on caging them in. Despite the odds, they manage to find their escape from hardship in their mutual friendship. Beautiful... a must read!

Great second novel	Customer Rating:
The kite runner was one of the best novels I ever read. A thousand splendid suns comes close, but falls a little short. Which is like saying that Tiger Woods had an off year in 2007. Anything this man writes is worth reading.

Over-political

Customer Rating:

The book is a overdramatic tragedy in which most characters are losing. Rasheed, the main bad guy, has more than one wife. Rasheed was a widower before he married Mariam and Laila. The two wives are polar opposite in character - Mariam is loyal while Laila is rebellious. The opposite characters attract and become friends. Both women are foolish not to listen to their mothers, and as a result both women are like slaves under their husband. For example, if Laila, who becomes an orphan in her teens, had listened to her mother, she would not have been impregnated by Tariq and would not have to marry Rasheed. Throughout the book, Laila is hopeful even though she lives a difficult life under a burqa. Mariam repents for the rest of her life because of one mistake she makes. Mariam's stepmothers are straight out of Cinderella. Mariam respects and regards Rasheed until she found porno magazines in his room. As we go on in this book, Mariam has lost so much hope that she becomes almost unhuman. (One of the answers to the questions at the back of the book is Mariam signs her name for her wedding and for the sentence given to her by the Taliban judges towards the end.) Like the movie Titanic, which is mentioned in the book, the book has a few characters who are connected to each other and who are friends with each other (such as Jack and Rose, or Mariam and Laila) set against the backdrop of a disaster, such as the ship sinking or war in Afghanistan which has militiamen fighting. The book shows that Afghanistan is not a good place for even infant girls, such as Laila's daughter Aziza. The best part of the book is Aziza and her relationship with Mariam. The way the author describes Aziza's laughs and smiles is very good. There are some modern women in Afghanistan before militiamen started fighting each other. Islam in Herat plays a more important role the Islam in Kabul. There are racial and ethnic differences in Afghanistan, a poor country, just as in USA, the richest country in the world. The West and Soviet Union are not described much in the book, except when Bush declares war against Taliban. Hosseini's American citizenship could mean he has a condescending relationship towards Afghanistan. The name of the title appears in a poem which describes one moon and a thousand splendid suns.