A boy wins a kite. His servant pays for it. Twenty years later, the debt comes due.
Who drives the story
A wealthy Kabul boy who craves his father's approval and betrays the one person who worships him. He becomes a novelist in California, then spends the rest of the book buying back his soul in Taliban-ruled Kabul.
The Hazara servant's son with a cleft lip and unbreakable loyalty—his first word was "Amir." He is raped defending Amir's kite, framed for theft by Amir, and later killed by the Taliban for refusing to surrender Baba's house.
Amir's charismatic merchant father, disappointed in his son's softness, secretly Hassan's real father. He rebuilds his life pumping gas in Fremont and dies of lung cancer shortly after Amir's wedding.
A fellow Afghan refugee Amir meets at the San Jose flea market, carrying her own scandal. She marries Amir, cannot have children, and finally welcomes Sohrab as her son.
The blond, blue-eyed bully who admires Hitler and grows up into a Taliban official who executes people at Ghazi Stadium. Sohrab's slingshot takes his eye, closing the circle Hassan opened.
Baba's closest friend and the father figure Amir actually needed. His dying phone call—"There is a way to be good again"—sets the entire rescue in motion.
Hassan's son, named for a character in the Shahnamah, rescued from a Taliban official and an orphanage. Traumatized into silence, he smiles for the first time when Amir runs a kite for him.
Also in the story
Amir's driver back into Kabul, a man who lost sons to a landmine. He starts by distrusting the rich American and ends by helping him escape Assef's house.
How they are connected
The Hazara servant's son with a cleft lip and unbreakable loyalty—his first word was "Amir."
He is raped defending Amir's kite, framed for theft by Amir, and later killed by the Taliban for refusing to surrender Baba's house.
Amir's charismatic merchant father, disappointed in his son's softness, secretly Hassan's real father.
A fellow Afghan refugee Amir meets at the San Jose flea market, carrying her own scandal.
She marries Amir, cannot have children, and finally welcomes Sohrab as her son.
Sohrab's slingshot takes his eye, closing the circle Hassan opened.
Sohrab's slingshot takes his eye, closing the circle Hassan opened.
Baba's closest friend and the father figure Amir actually needed.
Baba's closest friend and the father figure Amir actually needed.
Hassan's son, named for a character in the Shahnamah, rescued from a Taliban official and an orphanage.
Traumatized into silence, he smiles for the first time when Amir runs a kite for him.
Amir's driver back into Kabul, a man who lost sons to a landmine.
Go deeper
Guilt and redemption · Fathers and sons · Betrayal of friendship for love · Class and ethnicity
Themes explainedThe full story act by act, the ending explained and a quick quiz.
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