Raoul’s First Response to the The Kite Runner

After reading the first forty pages of The Kite Runner, I was in shock. My first impression of Khaled Hosseini’s work showed me that he is an amazing writer. He wrote The Kite Runner “with sound, grammar, and interesting style” (pg. 32); however, I find the significance and power of his story to be on a level that I have never read before.

            As a Muslim and Arab descendent, who lives in the western world, I know little of the Middle Eastern genocides and power struggles. I like that The Kite Runner is showing me the history behind the problems in Afghanistan. I never fully understood the struggle between Shi’as and Sunni’s, but I believe that The Kite Runner is going to grow my understanding of the problem.

            On the down side, I found the names hard to keep up with. There were a lot of names thrown out in a short period of time, and because they are unfamiliar names for me, (an American) they are harder to memorize. But honestly I am not the best person with names, so it is probably just me. Other than that I found nothing, in the first forty pages, that I did not like.

I kind of want to know if this is a true story, but I also refuse to Google The Kite Runner because I am scared of seeing any spoilers. If any one wants to be a good friend and tell me whether or not it is a true story, it would be awesome J.