A Thousand Splendid Suns

So I've been reading A Thousand Splendid Suns by Kholed Husseini, albeit slowly. But last night we got a rare treat, a couple of hours of silence so we could read!! Bill read his Sherlock Holmes and I, Suns. It is such an incredible book, although a bit sad.
It is the story of the last 30 years of Afghanistan as told through the eyes of 2 women as they grow up in Kabul. One of the women has a daughter and the lengths she goes to to protect her as much as possible is awe inspiring. It really made me take stock of how incredibly blessed we are. We have a healthy girl who is loved by her father and her mother, unlike in the book. Rasheed is a deplorable character!! Ugh. I also feel blessed that I have never known the pangs of poverty and starvation. I have never had to worry about how I was going to eat or how to divide up small amounts of food for my child and the rest of our family. I have never known the pain of her tears with no moisture because of dehydration. I, as my daughter, has the freedom to move about the world without fear of repression and torture. There was more than one point in the book where I was reduced to tears for what this little family was going through and partly because I am so glad we are so lucky in our family to never know those types of struggles.And I hope that more areas of the world will be as lucky as we are to experience these types of freedoms and acceptance.
I finally stopped reading and went to bed around 1:30am. I told myself I wasn't going to stop until there was a somewhat happy point in the book, which honestly, took a while!