Review first published on my blog: http://memoriesfrombooks.blogspot.com/2013/06/and-mountains-echoed.html
And The Mountain Echoed tells the story of how one decision touches so many lives and how the repercussions travel through time and place. Abdullah and Pari are brother and sister living with their father, stepmother, and stepbrother in a small village in Afghanistan. Through unimaginable and desperate decisions, they are separated when Pari is only three years old. And the Mountains Echoed follows the stories of those touched by this choice - Abdullah who remembers, Pari who forgets, Nabi, the Wahdatis, Parwana, and Markos.
The different sections of this book tell the story from the perspective of the individual characters. It begins in 1950s and continues almost to present day. The geographic reach of the book goes from Afghanistan to Paris to Greece to the United States.
The individual sections of the book to me almost stand alone as stories - completely engrossing stories beautifully told. Yet, for me, the continuity is not there. The characters and the settings and the focus is so diverse between the sections that they seem separate. It does not really hinder my enjoyment of the stories; it is just not what I expected.
A recurring theme in the book is that of stories and dreams and that each of us carries them with us. At one point, one of the narrators says, "A story is like a moving train: no matter where you hop onboard, you are bound to reach you destination sooner or later."
To me, that summarizes the book. Khalid Hosseini is a masterful storyteller. All three of his books have completely drawn me into the story and kept me there from beginning to end. I cared about the characters and cried and laughed with them. A masterfully written book with lots of threads to follow - each one making you care.
And The Mountain Echoed tells the story of how one decision touches so many lives and how the repercussions travel through time and place. Abdullah and Pari are brother and sister living with their father, stepmother, and stepbrother in a small village in Afghanistan. Through unimaginable and desperate decisions, they are separated when Pari is only three years old. And the Mountains Echoed follows the stories of those touched by this choice - Abdullah who remembers, Pari who forgets, Nabi, the Wahdatis, Parwana, and Markos.
The different sections of this book tell the story from the perspective of the individual characters. It begins in 1950s and continues almost to present day. The geographic reach of the book goes from Afghanistan to Paris to Greece to the United States.
The individual sections of the book to me almost stand alone as stories - completely engrossing stories beautifully told. Yet, for me, the continuity is not there. The characters and the settings and the focus is so diverse between the sections that they seem separate. It does not really hinder my enjoyment of the stories; it is just not what I expected.
A recurring theme in the book is that of stories and dreams and that each of us carries them with us. At one point, one of the narrators says, "A story is like a moving train: no matter where you hop onboard, you are bound to reach you destination sooner or later."
To me, that summarizes the book. Khalid Hosseini is a masterful storyteller. All three of his books have completely drawn me into the story and kept me there from beginning to end. I cared about the characters and cried and laughed with them. A masterfully written book with lots of threads to follow - each one making you care.
