Splendid Suns

A noteworthy book that I have just finished is A Thousand Splendid Suns by the Afghanistan-born Khaled Hosseini, the author, too, of The Kite Runner. It was in the bestseller lists by 2008 because it brings alive the turmoil of the past 30 years in Afghanistan and makes real the heartbreaking events that still disrupt the lives of families and tear at the social fabric there. The story is mostly about the heartbreaking life of Mariam, who finally killed her brutish husband when he was trying to kill the second wife in the household. Despite the circumstances, the Taliban judge sentenced her to death. In the last minutes of her life Mariam rises above all the hardships she had faced and has this reflection:

Mariam wished for so much in those final moments. Yet as she closed her eyes, it was not regret any longer but a sensation of abundant peace that washed over her. She thought of her entry into this world, the harami [bastard] child of a lowly villager, an unintended thing, a pitiable, regrettable accident. A weed. And yet she was leaving the world as a woman who had loved and been loved back. She was leaving it as a friend, a companion, a guardian. A mother. A person of consequence at last. No. It was not so bad, Mariam thought, that she should die this way. Not so bad. This was a legitimate end to a life of illegitimate beginnings.

Mariam then puts herself in the hands of God, “He makes the night cover the day and the day overtake the night”, as she kneels at the order of her executioner and waits for the bullet to her bowed head.
The novel continues with Mariam's positive tenor by describing how the willingness of some to share the difficulties of Afghanistan at war allows love to reach the most neglected.