Book Review: A Thousand Splendid Suns
Warning: This book does feature sensitive topics and includes mentions of death, child marriage, domestic abuse and more. Please take note before reading this article or reading this book if any of those topics may bother you.
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A Thousand Splendid Suns is a book that delves deeper into some darker aspects. It follows two girls, Laila and Mariam, as they go through their experiences as Afghan women growing up during the rise of the Taliban and other events that occurred in Afghanistan during the 1970s to early 2000s.
The book goes into a lot of struggles regarding the pair’s lives and they were not always together but due to events that happen in the book, they become a united front against the evils and injustice they experience.
Mariam is an older woman who was forced into marriage young and was forced to carry a child but found that she could not. Because of that, she was shunned by her husband, Rasheed.
Mariam is a young girl that grew up in the area that Rasheed lives in, Kabul. She is affected by the war in several ways, namely the loss of her family and friends. In recovery, she is forced into marriage with Rasheed as well due to the looks it would bring from outsiders.
The book opens with topics such as rape upon the forced relationship between Rasheed and the two women and it shows the disgust through the thoughts of the two girls. There are also talks of pain as a result, namely when Laila has her second child, Zalmai, she needs a c-section and the women’s hospitals are not being provided for, so she experiences the pains without any pain medicine and while awake.
The role of feminism plays a large part in the novel due to what is mentioned. Women’s rights are taken away and both Laila and Mariam feel the pain but have grown used to it because of how Rasheed treats them in their home.
Without going into more details about spoilers, the novel brings so much if you are interested in realistic fiction. I did not think I would like this book as realistic fiction does not tend to draw me in, but I could not stop reading this novel. I felt hooked in each moment, especially with the twists that were revealed. I would absolutely recommend this book to anyone out there who is interested by my review as it taught me a lot about how the role of women in Afghanistan during the time and it also taught me about things in history about which I did not know.
Overall Rating: 9/10.
