Fear of Flying

Nothing was more symbolic of the Taliban's fall than the appearance of a forbidden kite in the skies over Kabul. Breathless news accounts heralded it as a harbinger of Afghanistan's rebirth; the killjoy Talibs were gone and music, which they had also banned, played at their wake. But in Khaled Hosseini's debut novel, The Kite Runner , this symbol of liberation serves only to remind Afghan refugee Amir of a past he has desperately tried to escape. Exiled to San Francisco, Amir revisits that past in a series of flashbacks set amidst Afghanistan's war-wracked history. What begins as a rosy portrayal of...