Review: The Kite Runner

I suppose I should begin this book review by saying that prior to reading this novel I have also read another of Khaled Hosseini's works titled 'A Thousand Splendid Suns' which is an absolutely fantastic story - so I had high hopes for this one too.

Khaled Hosseini is an Afghan-born American novelist who was born in Kabul in Afghanistan, which is where the majority of this novel is set. Hosseini lived in Kabul for most of his childhood and then moved to France and shortly after seeked asylum in the United States, where he soon became a citizen. Therefore imaginably the setting, culture and lifestyle of this novel will have probably resembled the way of life he experienced living in Afghanistan, which means that the reader can grasp a vivid understanding and image of what it was like to live in Kabul during the late 1900's. 

The Kite Runner focuses on a young boy in the 1970's named Amir who is born into a fairly well-off family when considering Kabul's situation at the time. His mother died during his birth, therefore it is only him and his father - along with their servants Ali (his father, Baba's good friend) and Hassan (a Hazari who is looked down upon in society but despite this, is Amir's best friend). The novel looks at life in Kabul, how society dominates Afghanistan, good and bad relationships between the characters, the Taliban invasion and how drastically the country changes over the years. 

Amir wants nothing more than for his father to feel proud of him as a son and to love him how he loved his wife (Amir believes his father hates him for killing his wife during the birth but this is not the case). Baba is a good man who loves his son more than anything but is concerned that he is not like other young boys - Amir likes to read and write whereas most others enjoy more masculine activities. 

A large amount of the narrative spotlights the 'friendship' between Amir and Hassan and we watch their friendship deteriorate throughout the novel as a villainous boy Assef and his gang pick fights with Hassan over his Hazari background; but the plot thickens between these two characters. Despite Amir being his friend he struggles to defend Hassan and we see cowardice in every situation he is faced with, which leaves his father more concerned about his personality. As the old way of life in Kabul is destroyed as the Taliban roll up, Baba and Amir emigrate to the United States to build a better life for themselves away from the terrorism. Hosseini reflects back constantly to the friends both Amir and Baba make along the way and how each of them either develops or declines - Hassan, Rahim Khan (Baba's best friend), Soraya (Amir's wife) etc. 

One aspect of this book that I noticed instantly within the first few pages was Hosseini's incredible ability to set the scene and to describe both times and places. The author's in-depth descriptions allowed me to feel as though I was actually there in Kabul experiencing every event for myself - although thankfully not literally. I know myself that some books that try to set the scene and depict an atmospheric location can often focus too much on certain aspects and leave the reader quite bored and frustratingly waiting for some dialogue to get the narrative going. However Hosseini knew exactly how much description was just enough to create imagery and get the story off to a good start.

I love how this book is so emotive too, it had me feeling so many ways - happy, sad, relieved, content, panicked. The best way I can describe the story is one massive bumpy rollercoaster; one minute the story picks up and life is good and the next a turn of events causes a crumble in the narrative. I think it's always a good sign when a story can evoke so many different emotions. If I were to sit and read a book and feel absolutely nothing throughout I would find it to be an utter disappointment. I also found it admirable how Hosseini's character descriptions and portrayals successfully made me feel how I did towards each of them. For example, I despised Assef and his evil ways, I pitied Hassan to an unimaginable extent, I admired Baba for his generosity and genuine self etc. However the only character I didn't know how to consistently feel towards was Amir (once you read the book you'll understand why); sometimes I empathised with him and other times I didn't - but I think that was Hosseini's intention largely.

This truly was such a moving and equally devastating story that I couldn't have possibly enjoyed more than I did. If you like reading more non-fiction, real-life books I strongly recommend this.

The 1975 Album Review

If you're anything like me then you love the majority of chart music. Yes I said it. I may have sinned in doing so but nevertheless it is true. Usually every 2-3 weeks I scan the UK Top 40 to see if there are any newcomers as I really like to keep up-to-date with music. I refresh my 'To Listen To' playlist probably more often than is healthy but I like to stay in the loop. 

As a result of this regular routine I came across The 1975's single 'Chocolate' last year and fell in love with the track. I'm not really one of those people who has a specific favourite genre of music; I like a wide variety. I do like a bit of pop, soft rock, indie, electronic and some hip-hop too. 'Chocolate', for me, was just one of those songs you listen to as little as twice and completely just have a feel for. 

It took me several months of listening to the single (I listen to it even now and it has the same effect on me: I am still not sick of it) before I even thought to find out if The 1975 had other singles or even an album. Their debut album was released September 2nd 2013 but I only purchased it January of this year. 

Now let me tell you, I have been listening to this album for nearly 4 months and I cannot get enough. I must have replayed each song an infinite amount of times and am still in love with all of them.

As I said I love all of the songs from the album but the ones I particularly listen to a lot are The City, Girls, Sex, Talk!, M.O.N.E.Y and Pressure. The 1975 are described as an alternative rock band and the album does completely encapsulate the genre to a T. 

Besides the tracks on the album, another thing I cannot get enough of is the leader singer, Matt Healy's voice. He has such a raw and stripped-down vocal and it coheres so effectively with the instrumentals of each song. Admirably the band write their own songs too which is unsurprisingly not a common thing for artists/bands/groups to do in the music industry anymore. 

The 1975 are actually in the middle of their worldwide tour and to my dismay I have been unfortunate not to know anything about it until a few weeks ago. But there's always next year - hopefully!

I would give the album overall a 4.5 star rating. It's great so definitely give it a listen.

Here are my two favourite songs to get you started!

An Introduction

The truth is, I've wanted to blog for ages. For the longest time I've been inspired by the likes of Zoella and Patricia Bright - both phenomenal and influential bloggers. But my dilemma was always "What would I blog about?" That's what kept me back. 

I'm a student currently studying at the University of Sunderland, doing a degree of English and Journalism. I absolutely love writing and have done as far back as I can remember. I remember even in Primary School, English was always my favourite subject as we'd read such interesting stories and even get the chance to write our own. My head was always jam-packed with the most crazy and surreal storylines and quite often I found myself obtaining 'Star Writer.' From a young age my love for writing blossomed and is now something I'm really passionate about and subsequently would love to pursue a career in; whether it be a magazine or newspaper journalist, an author, or even a role in marketing and promotion. For now though, I still have a few more years to decide which of these I'd ideally want to do.

In deciding that I finally wanted to start a blog I thought back to my original problem: what it was I was going to blog about. Then it occurred to me that a blog doesn't need to have a genre or a main focus - a blog is your own and to write whatever you feel like writing. I like to think of this new writing space as somewhere I can practice my writing skills and further myself. I feel a good place to start is to write about your interests, as well as anything else you feel strongly about. I have a strong interest for beauty, fashion, musicals, books and films - so you may expect to see future posts on any of these. Another role I want this blog to play is my own little portfolio towards my degree. Therefore there may be some both serious and investigative pieces of journalism to come, or some news stories of local incidents and issues.

I'd like to mention that at the moment I am working to further my writing experience not only by blogging but I am also involved with contributing to two student-run websites - SR news and Spark magazine. I have been a weekly writer for the beauty category of Spark magazine since October last year, but have just recently started writing articles for SR news.

www.sr-news.com

www.sparksunderland.com/magazine

As part of my degree I will be writing for these two websites still but I just wanted a space where I could write anything I was feeling. Some days I just feel like writing something less serious, maybe a bit more witty and light-hearted and not always an article about an overturned car injuring an elderly woman. You know? Although I do know that I'd like to sink my teeth into writing a big investigative piece of journalism some time in the history of this blog. But we'll just see what happens...

I have widgets to the left where you can feel free to follow me on Twitter, Instagram or Bloglovin' to keep up with what I'm doing, thinking and enjoying.