Consciência a quanto Obrigas


O Menino de Cabul é um livro de História narrado em histórias. Porém, ocupa-se sobretudo dum percurso comandado pela Consciência. Aquela sentinela incansável que nos atormenta, sempre com um dedo acusador a apontar cada erro! Aquele farol que nos dita os passos até à redenção — o auto-perdão que concede a tão almejada paz!

É possível escapar à guerra que acontece lá fora, mas não à que fervilha cá dentro!

O Menino de Cabul recorda-nos que a nossa missão como membros da Humanidade é consagrarmo-nos vencedores absolutos dessa malfadada Guerra Interior — de Batalha em Batalha, bravamente, até à vitória final

Before I started this book, I distinctively remember running my hands over the cover, over the embossed letters that read, The Kite Runner, with not a thought spared but just a sense of hope and anticipation.

Now, after I've finished it, I'm once again running my hands over them.
Those letters that read, The Kite Runner.
Those letters that mean a lot more than what they seemed to a few days ago.

Yes.

Oh.

No.

Yes.

Oh.

n  Oh.n

This is just a tiny fraction of "Oh"s that I felt during my journey through this beauty and beast of a book. And each of these differ in what they incited, invoked, in me. Yet all so powerful and painful and grudgingly piquant.

If you want a psychoanalysis of the characters and a dissection of the plot lines, with a thousand different adjectives for the mesmerizingly written prose, you're at the wrong place. Seriously. This is just going to be me, and my flailing traitorous emotions.

So, What do I feel ?

n  Beauty. Yes, I feel beauty.n
Marred with reality, with the wonder and ugliness, with all of it.

n  And I feel love.n
Love towards this book.

n  Amir and Hassan, the Sultans of Kabul.n

Towards everything that should not have gone wrong.

n  And I feel hatred.n
Hatred against what happened.
What shouldn't have happened. No.
And at everything that did go wrong.

n  I feel horrorn, that is not macabre, but so vicious, so cruel, it hurts. An undercurrent of anguish that haunts you wherever you go.

n  And I feel love againn, with all it's highs and lows and everything in between.

n  For you, A thousand times over.n

n  And I feel a lot more.n
That I'm just not able to articulate.


And I didn't cry.
Maybe because, in order to cry there must be frissons of lachrymosity rocking me. But when even happiness forecasts heartbreak, when the whole book is a shadow of melancholy cloaking me, wistfulness following me, crying is a reprieve that I feel this book has denied me. Why ?

Even though there are no tears, I know that I'm as close to crying, bawling and sobbing inconsolably all at once than I've ever been for I'm a turmoil inside.

I want to underline that what I write now is my personal opinion. You are the master of your own morality. I could write another review but I'm in no mood for it. There's more than 100 000 of it on gr. Some of thoughts that the book gave me.

I was looking at the reviews, maybe not at many, but I noticed one thing - it's about Amir's bad deeds, regret, and atonement. Okay, certainly it is, the writer clearly had such intentions. The question is if he was the worst of the positive characters, or if really his deeds were the worst. Baba was sleeping with two women. He was cheating on his wife which is of course very bad thing.

Amir did some bad things. What about the witnessing what they did to Hassan without any reaction? Surly he couldn't beat them, but at least could try to distract them, screaming could make them lose the desire for love. I think it would be enough to scare one of his two dogs. But they were in such place that it would hardly give any effects. After that Amir did something even worst. For this thing there's no such explanation like I can't beat three boys even older than me - he rejected his best friend when he needed him the most. If Amir still was his friend, Hassan probably wouldn't loose his weight.

The question is what was the single worst deed, except what Assef did? When the Taliban enter the house where Hassan lived with his family he should obey them. There's such rule that if you want to play Rambo, do it on your own account. He exactly knew how bad they were even before they took the power. He couldn't stop them, but he could make them angry, so they killed him and his wife. It was the single worst thing that the good characters did. The ability to predict the consequences of your deeds is a wisdom, but I think in real life Hassan would obey them. It was obvious what they were, and still are capable of. Some of the consequences were postponed in time - the guy who raped Hassan was raping his son. Don't play Rambo when it can be dangerous for others. The novel is written in first person narrator which is Amir, so the narrator doesn't think my way.

A Thousand Splendid Suns is like six-star book, like a book of decade but this one deserves five stars.

I AM SO EMOTIONAL DON'T TOUCH ME.
This story was beautiful and I learned so much from it and man. Just so good.
I also read this for #diversathon (even though I'm finishing it about a week later) and I really feel like I learned so much about a culture that I really knew nothing about. It was eye opening and interesting and so educational.
The characters were beautifully written and Amir was fantastically developed. Overall the plot was engaging though the pacing lacked at times. The message was beautiful and the ending made me cry.
Read this book IT IS GREAT.

I have some criticisms for this book, but because I chewed through it in such a short amount of time, I'll start with what I like and move to the criticisms.

I did NOT want to like this book. I am one of those annoying people who wants to dislike what everyone else likes, and wants to like what everyone else dislikes. Usually, this works out for me without effort; however, in the world of literature there are occasions that it does not. This was one of those occasions.

The book was brutally heartbreaking, but redemptive. Relationships were richly developed, emotions piqued and dropped - hallmarks of a good story.

One of my favorite things in literature is learning. If I learn from a book, I consider it valuable. Bite-sized foreign languages lessons will bolster a book's merit. This author taught me about the history, language, and geography of Afghanistan, and about the sport/hobby of kite flying/kite running. I've always thought that a person just bought a kite and flew it. I've never heard of coating the string in cut glass to cut down other kites.

The book has numerous other redeeming qualities that are likely to make it a classic read, but it does have some flaws. One thing that just kept annoying me toward the end of the book was the names of John/Thomas and Betty Caldwell. The first time they're mentioned, they're Thomas and Betty Caldwell. The next time, they're John and Betty Caldwell. WELL? Which are they?? Where was the editor on this one? No, it didn't affect the story, and it shouldn't affect me, but it did. I kept finding my thoughts drifting. Because they were never real characters, did the editor/author not find them integral to the plot? Did they have the same issues with Thomases and Johns that I have with Kamals and Kamirs? Perhaps they're unfamiliar with the names, and so it was easy to make the mistake? I admit, I was plagued. I thought about removing a star for it, but we only have 5 stars with which to work, so I didn't.

The next flaw is perhaps in my own ignorance, but I can't imagine Assef being in the Taliban. The tale describes him as blonde and blue-eyed. I don't imagine him being part of a hate-group that targets Americans as infidels if he so closely resembles one, but I have also heard that there are blonde and blue-eyed Afghans, so perhaps this is my own ignorance shining through. I have Afghan friends, but none of them has blonde hair, or blue eyes. Further, Assef is absolute evil from an age at which I'm not convinced that any child has such a developed sense of hatred, especially when we consider that, upon meeting his parents, we find them timid. Again, this could be my own ignorance of children outside of my own culture, but it's a bit tough to swallow. I didn't find it too difficult to suspend my belief, but there wasn't too much else in the tale that required such suspension.

Overall, the book has all of the ingredients needed to create a great tale - whether or not it required some belief-suspension and some editorial errors. When I complete a book in one sitting, I cannot convince myself that I didn't enjoy it. I must be true to the obvious and give it 5-stars.

Khaled Hosseini never disappoints

ابدأ رحلتك مع الرواية، تجرّع ما بها من وجع على مهل
وعند النهاية، ستدرك أنك لن تنساها.. أبدًا
لأنها ببساطة كُتبت لأجلك، ألف مرة و مرة.

Page 78. That's the page that made me cry and curl up into a ball. I'll remember page 78 for a long, long time - if not for the rest of my life.

What can I say about The Kite Runner? Hosseini set out on a mission - to portray Afghanistan with accuracy and emotion - and in several scenarios, he succeeded. Amir's progression as a protagonist captured me, and even if he was unlikeable, his growth ultimately won me over. Though the book's magic blew me away in the beginning and dissipated toward the end (not sure exactly why, there was something off-putting about the plot/foreshadowing), I loved the themes ranging from redemption to honor to sacrifice. While I wouldn't say the characters themselves have a place in my heart forever, I can see myself discussing the literary elements of this novel far into the future. I'll end this with a quote that stuck out to me and epitomizes Hosseini's writing style:

I wondered if that was how forgiveness budded, not with the fanfare of epiphany, but with pain gathering its things, packing up, and slipping away unannounced in the middle of the night.

I knew that the book about Afghanistan would be painful to read yet still I'm devastated. The story shows us the deeper understanding of the country's tragedy: generations of tortured and raped orphans, exultation of cruelty and triumph of psychopaths. And it was even more hardly for me to read the story of immigrants, cos I keep recognizing myself and other Ukrainians in them.

lovely book,specially use of metaphor and hyperbole.
Just loved way of writing.

"“When you kill a man, you steal a life. You steal his wife's right to a husband, rob his children of a father. When you tell a lie, you steal someone's right to the truth. When you cheat, you steal the right to fairness.”"

Incredible. That's all.

I'm in love.

The novel of Amir and Hassan is a powerfully, well-written story. Amir is the son of a Pashtun aristocrat who lives in Kabul, Afghanistan. Hassan is the son of a Hazara servant, Ali. The boys have a strong friendship growing up. Their favorite activities are Amir reading stories to Hassan, and them competing in the kite flying competition. Their friendship remains despite lies, jealousies, politics, sexism and cruelty. The distance between them does not dim the memories of each other, or the feelings the boys have for each other.

This impressive novel reads like a fictional biography. We witness everything through the eyes of Amir. I want to label it a coming-of-age story, but it is so much more. The narrative is heart warming yet filled with danger. There is the rape of a child, and the violence of war and of cruel rulership written within this fictional account. We feel the friendship and the effect of lies. Amir's father tells him that the greatest sin is theft. He said, There is only one sin. And that sin is theft . . . . When you tell a lie, you steal someone's right to the truth. (225) This is powerful to me, but not as heart felt as Hassan's comment to Amir, "For you, a thousands times over." This statement expresses his closeness and loyalty to Amir. This powerful story will stay with me for a long time. I recommend it with the warnings listed above.