And the Mountains Echoed

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Saboor, an impoverished farmer from the fictional village of Shadbagh, decides to sell his three-year-old daughter Pari to a wealthy, childless couple in Kabul. Abdullah adores Pari, and helps collect various feathers for her which she loves. Hosseini graduated from Independence High School in San Jose in 1984 and enrolled at Santa Clara University, where he earned a bachelor's degree in biology in 1988. The following year, he entered the University of California, San Diego, School of Medicine, where he earned his M.D. in 1993. He completed his residency in internal medicine at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles in 1996. He practiced medicine for over ten years, until a year and a half after the release of The Kite Runner. Saboor’s bedtime story to his children opens the book. To what degree does this story help justify Saboor’s heart-wrenching act in the next chapter? In what ways do other characters in the novel use storytelling to help justify or interpret their own actions? Think about your own experiences. In what ways do you use stories to explain your own past? Hughes, Kim (May 16, 2013). "And the Mountains Echoed by Khaled Hosseini: Review". The Star . Retrieved August 24, 2013. Having recently lost a baby to the frigid Afghan winter Saboor decides to sell Pari to the Wahdatis - a wealthy childless couple in Kabul - to provide a better life for his family.

Linklater, Alexander (May 25, 2013). "And the Mountains Echoed by Khaled Hosseini – review". The Guardian . Retrieved August 24, 2013.a b c "Khaled Hosseini condemns Western 'fortress mentality' ". Dawn.com. October 19, 2013 . Retrieved November 2, 2013. Balee, Susan (June 23, 2013). "Tales 'we're not entitled to' ". Philly.com . Retrieved August 25, 2013.

Here's something you should know about Khaled Hosseini: All his stories have more or less, the same ingredients. Oh that felt like blasphemy to type, but I’ve gotta be honest here. I loved The Kite Runner and A Thousand Splendid Suns, but Hosseini just missed the mark with this one. Subsequent chapters expound on how the arrangement came to be: the children's stepmother, Parwana, grew up as the less-favored child to her beautiful twin sister Masooma. One day, in a flash of jealousy because Masooma and Saboor were to be wed, she pushed Masooma out of a tree resulting in paraplegia. Parwana subsequently spent several years caring for her sister until the latter asked her to help her commit suicide and to then marry Saboor. At Masooma's request Parwana takes Masooma out to the middle of nowhere and leaves her there. Their older brother, Nabi, left to work for Mr. Wahdati, a wealthy man in Kabul, and became infatuated with his wife, Nila. After Nila expressed dismay about her inability to have children, Nabi arranged for Pari to be sold to the couple, because Parwana has given birth to a son and Saboor cannot support 3 children. After Pari is sold in Kabul, Nabi is no longer welcome in the village. The novel begins with a tale of extraordinary sacrifice that has ramifications through generations of families. What do you think of Saboor’s decision to let the adoption take place? How are Nila and Nabi implicated in Saboor’s decision? What do you think of their motives? Who do you think is the most pure or best intended of the three adults? Ultimately, do you think Pari would have had a happier life if she had stayed with her birth family?Valdes, Marcela (May 20, 2013). "Book review: Khaled Hosseini's 'And the Mountains Echoed' is riveting and complex". The Washington Post. Archived from the original on May 25, 2013 . Retrieved September 5, 2013. In And the Mountains Echoed, Khaled Hosseini presents a multitude of windows into the souls affected by these events. The novel’s rich kaleidoscope of images coalesces around one theme: the powerful and often excruciating legacy of family ties within the maelstrom of history.”— Shelf Awareness Nila Wahdati is a young French-Afghan woman renowned for her sexually charged poetry who is married off to a wealthy Kabul businessman. According to Hosseini, many aspects of her character were derived from women he encountered during parties his parents hosted in Kabul in the 1970s, many of whom he recalls as "beautiful, very outspoken, temperamental...drinking freely, smoking". [16] At some point prior to the beginning of the story, she was apparently sterilized while undergoing treatment for an illness, leading her to buy Pari as an adopted daughter. Described as unusually beautiful and discontent, she later relocates to Paris following her husband's stroke and eventually commits suicide. Hosseini explained that he was unconcerned with making Nila likable—"I just wanted her to be real – full of anger and ambition and insight and frailty and narcissism." [16] There are many good moments in the book, such as when a character recognizes their selfishness and vows to do better. Or when relatives have been reunited after a long separation because of the war. And as the story unfolds, we must ask if Pari was better off being adopted, or should she have stayed with her family in the village?

a b c d Jain, Saudamini (May 26, 2013). "Khaled Hosseini and his new book And The Mountains Echoed". Hindustan Times. Archived from the original on May 29, 2013 . Retrieved August 25, 2013. Two homes form twin focal points for the novel: the family home of Saboor, Abdullah, and Pari—and later Iqbal and Gholam—in Shadbagh; and the grand house initially owned by Suleiman in Kabul. Compare the homes and the roles they play in the novel. Who has claims to each house? What are those claims based on? How do the questions of ownership complicate how the characters relate to one another?Hosseini's] beautifully written, masterfully crafted new book, And the Mountains Echoed, spans nearly 60 years of Afghan history as it investigates the consequences of a desperate act that scars two young lives and resonates through many others. . . . And the Mountains Echoed is painfully sad but also radiant with love. By the time Hosseini finally gets round to the reunion, via a Greek aid official living in the house in Kabul where Pari was adopted, he has compressed a dozen life stories into his novel and unified them through an irresistible substance of yearning. His end is not quite the expected coming together but, instead, a trigger for memory. The book opens with a legend about a giant who would go to a village and demand a child be sacrificed to him. A father was forced to give up his favorite son, and he was so heartbroken and upset that he later left the village to try and retrieve him from the giant. But when he arrived at the giant's house after many days of walking, he saw that his son was happy and was living a better life than he could have provided. The giant takes pity on the father and gives him a potion to help him forget his son. But did the father ever really forget? Discuss the question of wrongdoing and rightdoing in the context of the different characters and their major dilemmas in the book : Saboor and his daughter Pari; Parwana and her sister, Masooma; the expats, Idris and Timur, and the injured girl, Roshi; Adel, his warlord father, and their interactions with Gholam and his father (and Abdullah’s half brother), Iqbal; Thalia and her mother. Do any of them regret the things they have done? What impact does it have on them? Captivating and affecting . . . A masterful and compassionate storyteller, Hosseini traces the traumas and scarring of tyranny, war, crime, lies, and illness in the intricately interconnected, heartbreaking, and transcendent lives of his vibrantly realized characters to create a grand and encompassing tree of life.”— Booklist (starred review)