Finally!

"I wondered if that was how forgiveness budded, not with the fanfare of epiphany, but with pain gathering its things, packing up, and slipping away unannounced in the middle of the night."

"It was only a smile, nothing more. It didn't make everything all right. It didn't make anything all right. Only a smile. A tiny thing. A leaf in the woods, shaking in the wake of a startled bird's flight.
But I'll take it. With open arms. Because when spring comes, it melts the snow one flake at a time, and maybe I just witnessed the first flake melting."

What beautiful words to end a book that has so much of the ugliness of mankind in it. I have finally read Kite Runner. It had been in my to-read periphery for a long time. I started it a couple of weeks ago and wasn't really that impressed with the opening chapters, so I put it aside to read Beige (a work read). I was worried that Kite Runner couldn't satisfy or impress me enough to live up to its reputation--everyone that I know who has read it raves about its greatness. I shouldn't have been worried. Once I went back to it, I started being drawn into the story. I cried more than once as I read, and I wanted to read the book constantly. The last book club read was such a disappointment that I had been feeling rather listless about reading. I needed to fall in love with a book. Kite Runner cured my reading blahs.

I wasn't that impressed with Khaled Hosseini's prose style, but the plot of this novel is great. When I finished the book this morning at work, I wished that I knew how to talk about music. The language of this book is not musical, but the last three or four chapters felt like a symphony to me. Or I felt like a symphony should be the background music to this ending. I really can't explain what I mean, but my first thought after I read the last sentence was this: What an ending! I wish I knew musical terms. If I figure out how to explain myself, I will post more on Kite Runner later.

I think I will go read one of the stories in the latest book club selection, No one belongs here more than you, and go to bed. Oh wait, before I go, I just have to say one thing: What about those Cowboys! 11-1 and a clinched playoff berth. Woohoo! :-)