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Home / Review Book Club May 17 - â€å“and the Mountains Echoedã¢â‚¬â by Khalid Hosseini

Review Book Club May 17 - â€å“and the Mountains Echoedã¢â‚¬â by Khalid Hosseini

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And the Mountains Echoed: A Novel

past Khaled Hosseini

Published: 2013-05-21
Hardcover : 404 pages

220 members reading this now
66 clubs reading this now
109 members take read this book

An unforgettable novel about finding a lost piece of yourself in someone else.

Khaled Hosseini, the #one New York Times–bestselling author of The Kite Runner and A Thou Splendid Suns, has written a new novel nearly how we love, how we accept care of one some other, and how the choices we ...

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Introduction

An unforgettable novel nigh finding a lost piece of yourself in someone else.

Khaled Hosseini, the #i New York Times–bestselling author of The Kite Runner and A Grand Splendid Suns, has written a new novel nearly how we love, how we take care of one another, and how the choices nosotros brand resonate through generations. In this tale revolving around not but parents and children but brothers and sisters, cousins and caretakers, Hosseini explores the many means in which families nurture, wound, betray, honour, and sacrifice for i another; and how often we are surprised by the deportment of those closest to united states of america, at the times that affair most. Following its characters and the ramifications of their lives and choices and loves around the earth—from Kabul to Paris to San Francisco to the Greek island of Tinos—the story expands gradually outward, becoming more than emotionally complex and powerful with each turning page.

Editorial Review

An Amazon Best Book of the Month, May 2013: Khaled Hosseini'south And the Mountains Echoed begins merely enough, with a father recounting a folktale to his two young children. The tale is about a young boy who is taken past a div (a sort of ogre), and how that fate might not be equally terrible as it first seems—a brilliant device that firmly sets the tone for the rest of this sweeping, heartbreaking, and ultimately uplifting novel. A mean solar day later he tells the tale of the div, the father gives abroad his own daughter to a wealthy human in Kabul. What follows is a series of stories inside the story, told through multiple viewpoints, spanning more than one-half a century, and shifting across continents. The novel moves through war, separation, birth, death, deceit, and love, illustrating again and again how people's actions, even the seemingly selfless ones, are shrouded in ambiguity. This is a masterwork by a primary storyteller. —Chris Schluep

Excerpt

1

Autumn 1952

And so, then. You desire a story and I will tell you ane. Only merely the one. Don't either of you ask me for more. Information technology's belatedly, and nosotros have a long day of travel ahead of us, Pari, you and I. You volition need your sleep tonight. And you lot also, Abdullah. I am counting on you, male child, while your sister and I are away. So is your mother. Now. Ane story, and then. Listen, both of you, listen well. And don't interrupt. ...

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Discussion Questions

Word QUESTIONS

And the Mountains Echoed introduces us to Saboor and his children Abdullah and Pari, and the shocking, heartbreaking issue that divides them. From there, the book branches off to include multiple other characters and storylines before circling back to Abdullah and Pari. How do each of the other characters relate back to the original story? What themes is the writer exploring by having these stories counterpoint 1 some other?

The novel begins with a tale of boggling sacrifice that has ramifications through generations of families. What do you recollect of Saboor's decision to let the adoption accept place? How are Nila and Nabi implicated in Saboor'south determination? What do yous think of their motives? Who practice y'all remember is the most pure or all-time intended of the three adults? Ultimately, practice you recall Pari would have had a happier life if she had stayed with her birth family?

Think of other sacrifices that are made throughout the book. Are there certain choices that are easier than others? Is Saboor'due south sacrifice when he allows Pari to be adopted easier or more difficult than Parwana's sacrifice of her sister? How are they like and how are they unlike? Who else makes sacrifices in the book? What do yous think the author is saying nearly the nature of the decisions we make in our lives and the means in which they touch on others?

"Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing, / there is a field. I'll meet yous there." The author chose this thirteenth-century Rumi poem every bit the epigraph for the book. Hash out the novel in low-cal of this poem. What do yous retrieve he is saying most rightdoing and wrongdoing in the lives of his characters, or in the world?

The book raises many deep questions near the wavering line between correct and wrong, and whether information technology is possible to exist purely "skilful"—or purely "bad." What practise you recollect later on reading the novel: Are good intentions plenty to create good deeds? Tin positive actions come up from selfish motivations? Tin can bad come from positive intent? How do you think this novel would ascertain a good person? How would yous define i?

Discuss the question of wrongdoing and rightdoing in the context of the different characters and their major dilemmas in the volume : Saboor and his daughter Pari; Parwana and her sis, Masooma; the expats, Idris and Timur, and the injured daughter, Roshi; Adel, his warlord male parent, and their interactions with Gholam and his begetter (and Abdullah's half brother), Iqbal; Thalia and her mother. Exercise whatever of them regret the things they take done? What impact does information technology take on them?

The overlapping relationships of the different characters are complex and reflective of existent life. Discuss the connections between the different characters, how they are made, grow, and are sustained. Consider all the ways in which an consequence in one of the families in the book can resonate in the lives of so many other characters. Can you name some examples?

Saboor's bedtime story to his children opens the book. To what caste does this story assist justify Saboor'south centre-wrenching act in the next affiliate? In what ways do other characters in the novel apply storytelling to help justify or interpret their own actions? Think nearly your own experiences. In what ways do you use stories to explain your ain past?

Two homes form twin focal points for the novel: the family domicile of Saboor, Abdullah, and Pari—and later Iqbal and Gholam—in Shadbagh; and the one thousand house initially owned past 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 exercise the questions of ownership complicate how the characters relate to i another?

The erstwhile oak tree in Shadbagh plays an of import part for many different characters (Parwana, Masooma, Saboor, Abdullah, and Pari) during its life. What is its significance in the story? What exercise its branches stand for? Why do you call up Saboor cuts it down? How does its stump come up back equally an important landmark afterwards on?

In addition to all of the important family relationships in the book, there are as well many nongenetic bonds between characters, some of them just every bit strong. Discuss some of these specific relationships and what needs they fill. What are the differences betwixt these family and nonfamily bonds? What do you recall the writer is trying to say near the presence of these relationships in our lives?

And the Mountains Echoed begins in Afghanistan, moves to Europe and Hellenic republic, and ends in California, gradually widening its perspective. What do you lot think the author was trying to accomplish by including so many dissimilar settings and nationalities? What elements of the characters' unlike experiences would you lot say are universal? Practise you think the characters themselves would run into it that way?

Discuss the title, And the Mountains Echoed, and why you recall information technology was chosen. Can you notice examples of echoes or recurrences in the plot? In the structure of the storytelling?

Suggested by Members

Just pulled them off the internet.

(see contour) 04/28/fourteen

How would the story have been different if Pari had stayed in Afghanistan?

Why didn't Abdullah ever effort to find Pari?

by barclaypld (see profile) 04/14/fourteen

Lots of good, detailed discussion questions online.

by cpapuga (see contour) 02/12/14

What personal sacrifice would you lot make to secure a safe hereafter for your children?

Historically people would allow their children to be adopted to continue them from starving. Would you?

by cozette1946 (see profile) xi/07/13

The volume begins and ends with the "feathers" that Abdullah nerveless for Pari. What is the significance of the feathers and the imagery that it represents throughout the book?

by mfluke356 (encounter profile) x/18/13

Explain the themes of expectation and thwarting in many of the characters' lives.

Hash out all the connections between the various, seemingly disparate characters.

by lwbeards (meet contour) 07/24/13

Notes From the Author to the Bookclub

From Publisher's Weekly:

Hosseini'southward tertiary novel (afterwards A Thousand Excellent Suns) follows a close-knit but oft-separated Afghan family through beloved, wars, and losses more painful than death. The story opens in 1952 in the hamlet of Shadbagh, exterior of Kabul, every bit a laborer, Kaboor, relates a haunting parable of triumph and loss to his son, Abdullah. The novel's core, however, is the sale for adoption of the Kaboor's iii-year-old daughter, Pari, to the wealthy poet Nila Wahdati and her married man, Suleiman, by Pari's pace-uncle Nabi. The separate is peculiarly difficult for Abdullah, who took care of his sister after their mother's expiry. In one case Suleiman has a stroke, Nila leaves him to Nabi'due south care and takes Pari to live in Paris. Much later on, during the U.South. occupation, the dying Nabi makes Markos, a Greek plastic surgeon now renting the Wahdati house, promise to detect Pari and give her a alphabetic character containing the truth. The beautiful writing, full of universal truths of loss and identity, makes each section a gem, fifty-fifty if the bigger picture, which eventually expands to include Pari'south life in France, sometimes feels disjointed. All the same, Hosseini's eye for detail and emotional geography makes this a haunting read.

Fellow member Reviews

"Interesting writing style " by 8feetfast (see profile) 09/17/20

A master storyteller! This book is unusual in it'south writing manner from so many characters point of view. Somehow it'south done in non-defined way (you lot take to discover the "who" narrating) and it'due south non disruptive.... (read more)

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Source: https://www.bookmovement.com/bookDetailView/31392/And-The-Mountains-Echoed-Khaled-Hosseini