Reviews with content warning for Suicide - A Thousand Splendid Suns

Reviews tagging 'Suicide'

A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini

188 reviews

aaliyah_bilky's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful informative inspiring sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No

4.5

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hollyr1999's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix

4.5

I read this to learn more about a group of people i grew up taught to hate. This was heart wrenching and disturbing immediately and as the story progressed. It really brought personalization and means to connect with these characters that seem very accurate to real life.

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bookswithlauren's review

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adventurous challenging dark emotional funny hopeful informative inspiring reflective sad tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

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kindlekelly's review against another edition

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dark emotional informative sad tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.5

This book is hard going and not a light read. It broke me and I cried.

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ed_moore's review against another edition

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emotional sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.25

Hosseini’s ‘A Thousand Splendid Suns’ is the tale of two women surviving through the patriarchy and political turmoil of Afghanistan, this being the control of the soviets, violence and civil war between different rebel factions and the rise of the Taliban. It was a brutal and honest depiction of Afghanistan’s struggles which didn’t shy away from depicting the true horrors of living there from starvation, violence and patriarchal control, to war and occupation and the labours of childbirth.

It is difficult not to reflect on this alongside the other work of Hosseini’s that I have read: ‘The Kite Runner’ and whilst I preferred the longer term focus on the turmoils of Afghanistan which was lost in ‘The Kite Runner’s’ movement to America, I did however find myself much more attached to the characters of that book and to be more emotionally impacted by such. That may be down to gender resonance. That is not to discredit from ‘A Thousand Splendid Suns’ however, as it was still utterly heart-wrenching and persistently took from the reader alike to the persistent theft of the livelihoods of Laila and Mariam. His use of foreshadowing is also really effective but in cases a bit explicit, it is clear when such is occurring but I would conclude it still works well.

Reading in todays political climate, with the return of the Taliban plaguing Afghanistan, it was also likely more harrowing and impactful than it would likely be if I read such when it was published. Knowing the country has regressed to the under-occupation state it faced in the book after 20 years independence and rebuilding was constantly on my mind and made every tragedy Hosseini described even more saddening and relevant. Hosseini really has a talent for tugging on the heart strings.

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