A Thousand Splendid Suns – Khaled Hosseini

The tragic story of Afghanistan between 1960 and 2003 is told through the lives of two women.

Mariam, born out of wedlock and branded a ‘harami’, lives with her damaged mother in a ramshackle hut on the outskirts of Herat. Her father, already with three wives and ten legitimate children, does visit once a week to receive adulation from young Mariam and abuse from her mother. When the mother dies, Mariam assumes she will be taken in. Wrong. Aged fourteen she is married off to Rasheed, a shoemaker thrice her age, and is shipped off 650km to Kabul. Imagine her new life – no need, Hosseini tells it as it is.

Bigger events are at play as in 1978 the communist revolution takes place. The same year, down the road from Mariam’s house, Laila is born. She has a progressive father and benefits from the new regime’s programme of secular education (including for girls) for a while at least.

But not everyone in the country approves of the changes. They see the Russian support as invasion, communism as an atheistic attack on their religion, and call for Jihad. Laila’s older brothers answer the call, only to fall before the Russians are driven out. She barely knew them, but has a surrogate brother in schoolfriend, Tariq. As the friends gain puberty, friendship develops to love.

As the Russians pull out, Hell descends on Kabul as rival warlords fight for supremacy and control. People die and disappear. Laila needs a lifeboat and the shoemaker up the road, Rasheed, now in his sixties, makes her an offer she is in no position to refuse. Thus, Mariam and Laila are forced into an uncomfortable menage a trois.

The harsh realities of life in Kabul and a common violent enemy in their shared husband, pushes them into a mutual dependency that develops into trust and sisterly support. And that bond is tested, as events spiral, and conditions deteriorate in the city.

It is told with passion, pace, and prose that lays bare the horrors yet ennobles the struggle of the women. Tragic, yes; uplifting, maybe; thought-provoking, definitely.