A Thousand Splendid Suns is written by Khaled Hosseini, an Afghan writer who is best known for the book The Kite Runner. Set in a disturbed, tempestuous Afghanistan, during the second half of the twentieth century, the story revolves itself around the lives of two very ordinary, rather mediocre women. Females at that time did not have any personal value; they were merely properties of men—their fathers and then their husbands. To add to the tumult of being enslaved, the two women must face suffering Afghanistan. The country had to endure wave after wave of turbulences during the second half of the twentieth century: constant coup d’états, the invasion of the Soviet Union, and the rampant rise of the Taliban that left Afghanistan fragmentized. It was not a haven, or even a home, for its people, for its sons, and not to mention the suppressed women. With this setting as the backdrop, A Thousand Splendid Suns reveals how the lives of two women shatters in the era of war.

Mariam was born a harami, an illegitimate child. She and her mother lives in a kolba, a small shack built on a hill away but not far from the village where her father, the successful, wealthy Jalil, lives. She craves for the paternal love her mother forbids her having, so she left home and went to look for her father in the village. This is a move of destruction: it destroys her mother and leads to her mother’s suicide, and it also destroys the mask of a loving father Jalil was wearing.

Within a few days, Jalil’s wives, who consider Mariam a shameful burden, takes charge to marry her to an old Pashtun shoemaker Rasheed who lives in Kabul. At first, Rasheed is very encouraging of her works as a housewife, but after she miscarries seven babies, Rasheed becomes more and more “remote and resentful.” He becomes the tyrant in the house; he treats her with verbal violence, emotional abuse, and daily assault.

The other main female character in addition to Mariam is a girl named Laila who is nineteen years her junior. She grows up in a decent household with a mother, who spends every day mourning her brothers who had joined the army, and a loving father, who teaches her the value of education and independency. She also has a best friend and boyfriend Tariq who, although only has one leg, loves her and protects her. However, her happiness ends when war disrupts her life. As bombs start constantly striking the town, all of the neighbors start moving out, including Tariq. However, Laila’s mother insists on staying there to witness victory. Unfortunately, only a few days later, the war situation worsens. When her mother finally agrees to move, a bomb strikes her house, leaving Laila as the only survivor.

It is at this point that Rasheed finds Laila, and the lives of Laila and Mariam begin to intersect. When Laila finds out that she is carrying Tariq’s baby already, she marries Rasheed out of consideration for it. To further solidify the marriage and to cut off her hopes of running away, Rasheed tricks her by telling her that Tariq is dead, devastating Laila.

At first, Mariam dislikes Laila very much. However, Mariam’s affection for Laila’s daughter Aziza starts to change the situation. After Laila stands up for the older woman, the latter starts to share her emotions with the former, and they become good friends.

Together, Laila and Mariam attempts an escape. However, they are caught by the police and are escorted back home. Rasheed is furious and gives them a savage punishment.

As time passes, Laila gives Rasheed what he had always craved—a boy. But because the family’s income is unable to support so many people, thus, they send Aziza to the orphanage.

One day, to her great astonishment, she once again sees Tariq and finds out that Tariq’s death is a lie made up by Rasheed. Later that night, her husband hears from their son that Tariq had visited, and that Laila had talked to him, alone. Furious, Rasheed starts beating Laila, as well as Mariam for trying to cover for them. The violence soon escalates, and Rasheed begins to strangle Laila. Unwilling to witness Laila, the only person who has ever stood up for her, get killed by the abusive, sadist Rasheed, Mariam kills him with a shovel.

In the story’s conclusion, Mariam convinces Laila to go with Tariq and her children and to find her own life. However, the older woman has no one else who loves and cares about her, so she confesses her murder of Rasheed and sets Laila free. Thus, Mariam is shot, sentenced to death for her crime.

Laila, on the other hand, starts a new life with Tariq, as Mariam had hoped. When Laila decides to visit the village where Mariam grew up, she receives a legacy Mariam’s father had left for Mariam before he died: a letter, some money, and a cartoon movie tape Mariam had wanted to watch with his family. It is discovered that at the last of his moments, Jalil finally realized that he loves Mariam.

The story about Mariam and Laila is unrolled in four separate parts. Such an organization of the plot creates a unique effect.

The first two separate parts details the lives of the two main characters, Mariam and Laila, respectively. The content gives me a sense that they are distinctively different types of people. They live distinctively different lives—one is peeled away from all of her loved ones and the other has so many people that loves and cares about her—and at first, it seems that their destinies would hardly ever intersect. Even if their lives do, the two would not be able get along due to all of those differences.

However, at the third part of the story, the bomb brings the two women together under the same roof and braids their lives together. When the seemingly impossible event presented itself, I was surprised. This sudden union not only incited amazement, but also drove into focus just how powerful the force of war is.

In the subsequent events, Mariam and Laila become so close that I was made to forget about their initial differences. But after giving their situation a deeper thought, I realized that the differences were still there. It is only because collective suffering grinds off their sags and crests that they finally inosculates together—suffering brought by deprived human rights in orthodox Afghanistan and suffering brought by the ongoing war.

There is an idiom in Chinese, “如泣如诉” that means “as if weeping and grieving.” I think it is the perfect word to describe this touching story: weeping and grieving about the barbarity of some people, about the brutal faults of the suppressed status women in the orthodox Afghan culture, and about the ruthlessness of war.

Aside from a compelling plot, A Thousand Splendid Suns also has well-created characters. Mariam has a melancholic life. She is a character I could not help but sympathize with. Life had not been fair to her. She deserves none of the bad things that happens to her. It is never her mistake that her hypocritical father made her mother, a little housemaid, pregnant with her. Despite this, Mariam is taught by her own mother just how shameful her existence is to the world. It is never her mistake to crave for paternal love and to want a father that she can see every day. But her overly possessive mother blames Mariam for such a “betrayal” and punishes Mariam with her suicide, leaving Mariam without shelter. It is never her mistake that leads her into a nightmarish marriage. However, it is her father and her family who push her into the abyss. It is never her mistake that she could not carry a baby. But because of the iota of dignity and responsibility women are given, she is deprived of her sole value, which is giving her husband children. It is never her mistake that incites Rasheed to cold-bloodedly beat her up. However, it is because of Rasheed’s own twisted mind, craving for violence. It is not even her own mistake that leads to Rasheed’s final rampage. However, the situation forces her into committing homicide, and she pays with her life in redemption.

Strangely, I see no special characteristics in Mariam. She does not have her own thoughts, and she does not have a façade. She is just a normal orthodox Afghan woman. Everything she has done is forced by the fire and water she struggles through. She is a bitter fruit brewed by the burqas that veil women from the outside world. Though she does not have a façade, she is the aggregation of thousands of orthodox afghan women. She is the epitome of those in burqas: those who are deprived of their personal value, of their liberty, and of their appearances even. She alludes to the experiences any traditional Islamic women endure. She is ordinary and mediocre, but that is what make her experiences so appealing to the pathos.

Laila, on the other hand, is a representation of women of the new ages. She is independent, both physically and intellectually. However, neither of these makes her life any easier than Mariam’s. No matter how independent she is, she ends up marrying Rasheed the tyrant and observes the outside world only through the veils of her burqa. She ends up as a victim of the belt of an orthodox, sadistic husband. She ends up relinquishing her own daughter to the orphanage. She ends up a ragged, dilapidated doll, thrown over her feet by life—by the upheavals and war in her country, her home.

Laila and Mariam are the representations of the two types of women in Afghanistan: the educated women of the new ages and the unexposed women of the old ages. Despite this contrast, the two women lead similar life experiences. This underlines that people cannot withstand the power of war. And in war, no one can escape from suffering.

For many times, I nearly shed tears while reading this book. It was so moving that after living such a hard life, although Mariam did not find out herself, she can also be loved; it was so moving that after losing all those she loved in the bombards and enduring the torture of a purgatorial marriage, the love of her life returns to Laila and gives her a happy ending. All of these events seem as precious as gold mines, especially when the previous parts of the story are such tragedies, and they remind me of just how cruel war and society can be.

Overall, I think this is an inspiring and moving book that opened a crack in the door to the outside world—the world that is not as beautiful as the one I live in—and allowed me to peek into the repulsive sins of it, while also holding up a candle to warm me, reminding me that nonetheless, there will always be love in the world.