The pro-prologue of this 2007 novel has several
lines of appreciation from several media dorms and other famous people about
the book, all praising its author in his expertise in storytelling, the book’s
excellence etc. It does live up to the hype.
It is set over a period of about 40 years, starting
by 1964 and ending by 2003. It revolves about two girls, Mariam and Laila, who
arise in different time periods yet experience the same fate. It is based in
the country of Afghanistan and at the time where the Taliban slowly rise to
power. Subjugation of women by men and the tortures they were put into by the
Taliban, their peculiar policies about women, the hardships they undergo are
portrayed to the point by the author’s detailed descriptions.
The story starts off by teaching us a word in
Afghan Language (I suppose. The book also introduces two different accents of
the same), a highly detestable word. And that being said by a mother to a
daughter is sure to tell you that this novel is of no fantasy or romance or
thriller but of sour reality. Tragedy strikes in just a few pages from the start
in this 400 page book. Betrayal, Child marriage followed by utter helplessness,
creeps in. Now, if you are a person easily fed up and bored by melancholic
literature, you would very well close this book, go to sleep and never bother
to open it again. But if your curiosity drives you and you don’t want to leave
anything unfinished, you would go on to read it. You would be happy to be
introduced to an eye-candy after a short period where the omniscient genre of
‘child love’ enters. The second main character-Laila, surfaces. Laila is set in
a lifestyle very different from Mariam, yet, they ultimately end up under the
feet of a man through the legal polygamy. How this happens, you better read the
book.
The remaining pages deal with interpersonal
relationships and how two people love each other just because they intersect
with a common hate. Sympathy is the one feeling the reader oozes throughout.
The background also describes the rise and fall of many troops who try to gain
power. The Taliban gets control of Kabul where the girls share a residence with
their husband. How they struggle to educate Laila’s baby girl, Aziza, how
Rasheed, their husband tortures them, how physically and emotionally they
battle to get freed, how sacrifice gives peace is all explained in the later
pages with master class.
At the end, you would feel compelled to know more
about the struggles of normal people in Afghanistan who are most prone and most
affected by militant groups. You would sympathize with them. You would also
feel fortunate to be located elsewhere in this world. You would soon get to
know about the thousands of Afghan Refugees who live in lifeless conditions.
You would soon get to know about the Thousand Splendid suns behind her wall,
the thousands of women in Afghanistan behind their black veils.
Review by,
S. Surendiran,
Final Year,
Civil Engineering.
