Katie Hines

Summaries

A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini is focused, at first, around a young Afghan woman

named Mariam. She grows up with her mother, who clearly suffers serious psychological issues,

constantly berating Mariam and threatening to kill herself. Her father, who doesn't acknowledge her

as his own, visits her and brings presents, but never takes her out of the hell she lives in. Finally,

when she turns 15, Mariam runs away to Herat and finds her father's house, but he refuses to let her in

and she sleeps outside. She then is told her mother has committed suicide and she has been sold to a

man named Rasheed for marriage. He is abusive and cruel because of her inability to have a child,

which leads him to marrying a second wife, Layla. Layla grew up in Kabul with her soulmate, Tariq,

but when a freak explosion kills her parents and, according to Rasheed, Tariq, as well, she agrees to

marry Rasheed. Through years of torment and abuse, Layla and her new children bond with Mariam

like family, sisters. They endure Rasheed's cruelty when they attempt an escape, when he tries to sell

his daughter. Eventually, they are forced to kill Rasheed out of self-defense, as he was trying to kill

Layla, and Tariq comes back to them, not dead after all. Tariq, Layla, and the children escape Kabul,

but Mariam, despite Layla's protests, stays back and accepts her punishment: death.


The Kite Runner is a novel centered around a boy named Amir, recalling events that occurred when

he was a boy. He plays kite-fighting tournaments and plays with three boys, Assef, Wali, and Kamal.

As he grows older and more lonely, he tries to find Sohrab, an orphaned boy and adopt him, but

cannot, because his parents cannot be proven dead, but finally, he is able to, and they go to America.