July 11

And the Mountains Echoed
By Khaled Hosseini

As in his wonderful bestsellers, The Kite Runner and A Thousand Splendid Suns, Khaled Hosseini continues to show his understanding of human personality and relationships.  This book opens with a fable about a family whose child must be sacrificed to benefit her family and redeem society.  Like the child in the parable, Pari becomes the pawn that brings a more prosperous life to her Afghani family, while they also suffer remorse and second thoughts.  She meanwhile goes on to a difficult childhood, but a happy and successful adult life.  In the end, her two worlds come together and she gets to see what her life might have been.