The Kite Runner

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The book “The Kite Runner” is a story about a child’s life in Afghanistan that is always protected by a friend but when it comes to his friend needing help he betrays their friendship and that changes everything in his life. The author of “The Kite Runner” is Khaled Hosseini. He was born in Kabul Afghanistan and moved to the untied states in 1980. Khaled Hosseini graduated from Independence High School in San Jose in 1984 and enrolled at Santa Clara University. Then in 1988, he earned his bachelor’s degree in biology. His first novel was “The Kite Runner”. It was an international bestseller in forty different countries. His second novel was published in 2007. His second novel was “A thousand splendid suns”. It was the number one national best seller. In 2006 he was named a U.S. goodwill envoy to the United Nations refugee agency. He now lives in northern California with his wife Roya and their two children.

The setting for the book is Amir’s house, the streets of Kabul, San Francisco California, Peshawar Pakistan, the cemetery in Kabul, and other cities in Pakistan. The story takes place in Kabul Afghanistan, some cities in Pakistan, and San Francisco California. The places in the story mentioned above have an absolute location. For example, Amir’s house in Kabul is an absolute location. This setting is in a poor region with mountains and is small and crowded and is very old. There aren’t many resources for the people that live in this setting.

The place in most of the story is rural. In some parts of the story like San Francisco, it is urban. The weather described in the book for Kabul is usually windy, sunny, and warm. In San Francisco, it is usually foggy and rainy. In Pakistan it is humid and hot. The people there speak Farsi, English, and Urdu. Their main religion is Islam. However, in the book there are Muslim Sunnis and Shiites. They are mostly Afghanis, Pakistani, and American. In Afghanistan, they have a tradition where they hold a kite flying tournament every winter where they compete in trying to cut off each other kite. It is a tradition for the little kids to say agha or khan after a person’s name. In almost every household, there is a servant. Afghanistan is full of mountains, hills, some rivers, and some lush forests. Most of the story took place in Afghanistan. It is a historical setting because many famous and ancient people have roamed their streets and there are many artifacts around there. Back in the 1970s, the location was peaceful with green plants, the air was clean, the water was clear, and not many people were poor and homeless. But as time went by, the Taliban took over the country and ruined all its natural recourses, have wrecked many people’s homes, and have killed many innocent lives.

There some characters that travel and settle in a different place to modify their environment. For example, Amir and his father go to America where Amir gets married and finds a job and makes a living out of. The environment influences the way the characters live by making things easier on them like in America. And living in a place where you are free to do anything. Not where the government is bad and is controlling you and your life. Some of the people are wealthy and live in mansions, have servants and butlers, and are living in ease while others are average type people and others are poor, homeless, have to beg for a living, and have to face hardship and strive for survival. Many of the people in the story are friendly to one another but some people like Assef and his two other friends Kamal and Walid are troublemakers and they like to torture kids by beating them with brass knuckles. But the people are mostly friendly and help Amir go through his hardship in life. There are many activities people are engaged in like manufacturing. For example, Safio was a blind man that made and sold kites and he was a shoe repairmen. Some people worked in merchandise like Amir and his dad when they bought old and broken things from garage sales and went and sold them at the flea market. In the 70s, before Taliban took over there was enough food and water for everyone. Shelter was easy to maintain and only a few people were poor. But when Taliban controlled Afghanistan, it changed everything around. Water and food was scarce, many homes were demolished and the percentage of beggars became much higher than before. More homeless people arouse and things just got worst.

Amir and his father move to San Francisco California for Amir to start writing and get the books he writes published. The Afghanis have an idea to hate Taliban because Taliban is taking control of their country and they are killing anyone who defies their orders. The characters in the story get murdered, robbed, kicked out of their homes, and get their homes demolished by the Taliban. The economy is bad and people try to move out of the way of Taliban and their horror.

The climate is usually windy and sunny. That’s why flying kites there is successful. The hill where the cemetery and the pomegranate tree lies is green and beautiful. Amir and Hassan would usually go up there and read stories. The fruits and vegetation bought from the markets are very ripe and crispy. There are two different political regions such as Taliban and the regular people. These regions play a big role in the future of Afghanistan because soon if the regular people don’t act, Taliban will ruin Afghanistan and kill everyone there, starting a communist empire.

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