To anyone reading this review who has not read the book: here there be spoilers. Except not really, because Khaled Hosseini spoils his own book thoroughly.
Despite the author's best efforts to make us sympathize with Amir, the hero of the story, it is abundantly clear from the outset that Amir is, all in all, a total jackass. He's not evil in the way that the villain Assef is, but he's just as selfish and nearly as mean. The prime difference between the protagonist and the antagonist is that Amir is wussier than Assef, so Amir and his "friend" -- that is to say, "patsy" -- Hassan end up being the downtrodden party. But Amir forces Hassan into doing things he doesn't want to do, lets him take the blame for wrongdoings, and, to top it all off, lets him get raped. Yet we're supposed to sympathize enough with Amir to care when tragedy befalls him?
And speaking of tragedy, this book is so drenched in sorrow that I would not have been surprised to find it torn to shreds from cutting itself. If you can reliably predict the next thing that's going to happen by figuring out what the most tragic possibility is, then something went wrong. It is seriously the most depressing thing I have ever read, which might have been forgivable if the utter lack of surprise twists hadn't made it feel like I read it before. It had maybe one half-twist. Of course, that would make it a Möbius strip, so that might explain why it felt so predictably familiar as I re-walked the single tragic surface over and over and over and...
But even where the tragedy switches from a crashing wave of tears to an undertow which will inevitably drag you back in kicking and screaming, the foreshadowing ruins it. It's not even foreshadowing, really. Hosseini seems to think that foreshadowing is supposed to say, "This is what will happen. I thought I'd warn you." NO! That is not how you do it! If we know how it's going to turn out before we finish, what's the point of reading it? For instance, during the climax of the book, when Amir is about to enter the house and fight Assef (NO, THAT IS NOT A SPOILER. WHO ELSE WOULD IT BE?), it says quite plainly that it would be the last time for a while that Amir was eating solid food. If he won't be eating solid food for a while, that means he survived. Considering who he's fighting, he would need to win in order to survive. So basically, the author just told us that he wins. Well thanks for that, Hitchcock! He ruined the suspense! In his attempt to add tension to the thread of the story, he pulled too hard and it snapped, causing the tapestry (a shoddily-woven tapestry depicting nothing more artistic than a frowny face, but a tapestry nonetheless) to fall apart right as he was about to finish it.
Except no, he wasn't about to finish it. This book seems to really be three stories, all stapled together at the last minute with a few words changed so they connect a little better. First, there's the story of Amir's childhood, which ends with him pulling a dick move and forcing Hassan to leave. Second, there's the story of him going to America and finding a wife. This second section is fully one-third of the story, and its ONLY PURPOSE to the rest of the plot is to give Amir somewhere to take Sohrab for the last two pages. Time well spent! It was a nice diversion from the story, because I need my breaks built into the book; I can't be bothered to just set it down and pick something else up when I want to read an irrelevant story. The third story is of Amir going back to Afghanistan to rescue Sohrab, and it consists entirely of parallels to the first story which are meant to make me think "I see what you did there", but more often make me think "I saw what you were going to do there ten pages back". And this section of the book goes on far too long after the climax. He rescued Sohrab. Hooray, happy ending! ...wait, why are there still more chapters?
For the remainder of the book, Sohrab tries to kill himself, runs away, and generally makes it very difficult for Amir to bring him somewhere not quite as miserable without resorting to handcuffs and duct tape. The only loose end tied up in the last few chapters is the one regarding how they actually get to America, and that could easily have been left for the reader to figure out. The only purpose I see of letting this loose end linger for several chapters is so that it can lash out at the reader with more tragedy and punish us for not snapping the book closed and BURNING IT ALREADY.
(Inspired by the review style of Ben "Yahtzee" Crowshaw.)
Please note that this was originally written to answer someone who asked me what I didn't like about the book, and it is posted here primarily for humor; the book does have its merits, and Hosseini does show some significant writing skill (but in my opinion the book is still not very good).
