Khaled Hosseini’s second book is called “A Thousand Splendid Suns” and his third could have been titled “A Thousand Times Your Heart Will Break.”

“And The Mountains Echoed” is a ridiculously gripping story about a brother and sister in Afghanistan who are separated by their struggling widower father, along with the often tragic circumstances of his wife, her sister and brother, and many others they all become interwoven with throughout their lives.

It is a beautiful story, there is no doubt about that, with the way Hosseini paints these relationships in a way that makes you care so much about each person.  At some points though, you want to beg him to stop and have one of them win the lottery or something instead of enduring the profoundly sad.  When Abdullah and Pari, the brother and sister, go to Kabul and Abdullah realizes only he is going home, I wanted to yell out on the Metro, “WHY DID YOU DO THAT TO THEM?!”

Nabi, the children’s uncle, has his own struggle with knowing he loves someone and can’t be with, and yet retains the hope that somewhere, somehow, he could.

“I suspect the truth is that we are waiting, all of us, against insurmountable odds, for something extraordinary to happen to us,” he says.

That kind of hope underpins a lot of the characters as they try to overcome what they’ve been dealt, to try to make others proud, or in some cases throw success in the face of those who doubt.

I think Pari is the best example of getting up every day and moving forward despite what’s in her past, and is the most sympathetic character with how she treats others, and yet late in life she feels like she is a disappointment.

“I should have been more kind,” she says.  “That is something a person will never regret.  You will never say to yourself when you are old, ‘Ah, I wish I was not good to that person.’  You will never think that.”

Exactly.

This is one of those books that when you finish, you just want to sit and think about it for a while.  And then maybe hug someone.  And do a thousand favors for people.  Generally do something to make the world a better place.

One more note, courtesy of a Greek doctor who ends up renting Nabi’s house:

“Thalia puts before me a glass of milk and a steaming plate of eggs on a bed of tomatoes. ‘Don’t worry, I already sugared the milk.'”

I read this shortly after having a postgame lunch with my work softball team where one member talked about how his mom only let the kids have soda with their dinner if they mixed it with milk.  I’m fairly certain he called the concoction “pop milk.”  I can’t decide if that was designed to be so gross the kids wouldn’t ask anymore, or some attempt to make the experience slightly healthier.  I have no desire to test for myself.