Red Room Where the Writers Are

Review Excerpt:

I heard you read from A Thousand Splendid Suns in the Presidio in San Francisco just before I started reading this wonderful second novel. I remember hearing you read and respond to peoples’ questions and it crystallized for me that so much of the heart of your stories comes from the person that you are. And from your heart and experience springs the crystal clear characters you create. Sometimes you hear an author read from their work and the story and its characters remain distant and unknown, even to the author. In your case, when you spoke of Mariam and Laila, they were real and round and tender. And the truth is, there are a thousand Mariam’s and Laila’s in Afghanistan and throughout the world who live these realities, and for this reason I finished reading A Thousand Splendid Suns one Sunday afternoon and closed the book and cried for awhile. How lucky of a woman am I to never have to experience even an ounce of the pain Mariam and Laila endured. Thank you for taking me there and teaching me this, and I hope you are busy on your third novel.