So, then. You want a story and I will tell you one.
Anyone who has reconciled themselves to the fact that Khalid Hosseini has already exhausted the stock of their emotions, especially sheer despondence, ought to seek his latest offering to experience the intensity all over again.
Pari and her elder brother, Abdullah share a bond that can only decay in death because for Pari, her “Abollah” is no less than a parent and for Abdullah, Pari is just like the fairy her name translates into. Their young minds do not even waste time to contemplate their lives without one another. However, a ruinous journey of the two siblings with their father to Kabul culminates in the event that changes their lives once and for all.
‘And The Mountains Echoed’, the third book by the best-selling author Khalid Hosseini, is a peregrination across time and places with the reader finding oneself in circa 1952 and Kabul at one point, and circa 2010 and Tinos at another. With the decent shovel of a pen, the author has dug across boundaries and unravelled more haunting elements that remain invisible and, yet, are present around each one of us.
The story is a multi-generational family saga narrated from the perspective of several people which might force the readers to reluctantly lose a particular streak, though in the end the details merge to give us a clear image. Whether the book will be perceived at par with the previous ones is not known as of now because an inevitable comparison with its predecessors tells us that the book could use a more dense and prolific conclusion, a point that the previous books do not lack.
But above the grim reality that the author has introduced us with, he has told us a story because we wanted him to tell one.
But just the one…..
Rating: 3.5/5
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