| This is a book that will live for ever. In it Khaled | | | | one or other trap. Not so with The Kite Runner. |
| Hosseini has accomplished what many writers, most | | | | The plot is important, so suffice it to say that Amir |
| unsuccessfully, try to achieve. It’s the big | | | | and his family are in Afghanistan before the Russian |
| stories, those turning points in history, which often | | | | invasion. Their life is described. The Kite Runner of |
| attract us. They automatically have something to | | | | the title is the label for the role of the kite |
| say, we might believe, something that needs to be | | | | handler’s friend, who runs to retrieve the kites |
| aired, perhaps explained. So wars, revolutions, social | | | | that have been cut from the sky in combat. Finders |
| upheavals, periods of turmoil, internecine struggles, | | | | are keepers and it is this booty that is mutually |
| ideological conflicts, all of these are the natural | | | | fought over. |
| territory for the story teller. They are the backdrop | | | | With the arrival of the Russians, part of Amir’s |
| that adds potentially unlimited drama, the context | | | | family flees to the United States, Amir among them. |
| that can involve, inform and enlighten. | | | | He grows up there and we rejoin him years later, by |
| But often writers are not up to the task. The | | | | which time he is well on the way to becoming a |
| attraction of that big issue is greater than the | | | | creative writer and is about to marry. But his life in |
| powers of judgment needed to create the right | | | | the US has its imperfections, some of which are |
| balance when the smallness of the story’s detail | | | | sourced in the guilt of memory. And so Amir returns |
| is pitched against the vast potential dominance of its | | | | to his homeland to rediscover some of those he left |
| setting. The balance, therefore, is often a fine one | | | | behind. But now it’s an Afghanistan destroyed |
| and, because of the power of the setting, the story | | | | by war and dominated by the Taliban. Amir |
| is often belittled or, more usually, appears merely | | | | desperately tries to uncover his past, to trace those |
| trite against the overbearing importance and | | | | he seeks, and he succeeds, but sometimes in ways |
| significance of the backdrop. In recent times I have | | | | that he least expected, ways that further complicate |
| read several books which have revealed the | | | | an already tangled tale. |
| limitations of the writer’s concept by falling into | | | | |