New Book by Author of The Kite Runner

I've been promising Randy for almost 2 weeks that I would post something about A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini and since it came out yesterday I figured I better get busy.

Many of you are already familiar with my reading habits and you are aware that if a book is wildly popular I have probably not read it. Why is that? One reason is that our patrons will usually find out about those books some other way and I am trying to read some of the great books that don't get so much attention so that I can tell you about books you won't hear about anywhere else.

This leads to my confession that I had not read Khaled Hosseini's The Kite Runner until it was selected as the book for the May meeting of our dining book club. Being in a book club is a great way to catch up on books that you may have missed.

I am glad that I finally got around to reading The Kite Runner. I enjoyed it so much that when I finished it I immediately began reading the advance reader copy of A Thousand Splendid Suns that we had received from the publisher. If you enjoyed Hosseini's first book you won't want to miss this one.

While not a sequel, the author again sets his novel in his native Afghanistan. This story follows the lives of Miriam and Laila, two women from different backgrounds, who are brought together by a shared struggle to survive the volatile events of the last 30 years in a culture where women have few choices and little power over their own lives.

You may have heard the author on NPR this morning, if not, here is a link to the NPR Web site.

Thanks for reading.
Ann