The Kite Runner is a story of two boys and a father, and the strange love triangle that binds them.

Life is a train, get on board.

My own background is fairly liberal and so this notion of 'protecting women from outside intrusion' is not in my nature, nor in my upbringing.

Hassan couldn't read a first-grade textbook but he'd read me plenty. That was a little unsettling but also sort of comfortable to have someone who always knew what you needed.

Throughout the last century there were multiple attempts at giving Afghan women more autonomy, to change marriage laws, to abolish the practice of bride price and child marriage, and to enforce women to be involved in school. Every time, the reaction from the traditionalists was one of contempt and scorn and at times outright rebellion. I think the emancipation of women in Afghanistan has to come from inside, through Afghans themselves, gradually, over time.

Inside Laila too a battle was being waged : guilt on one side, partnered with shame, and, on the other, the conviction that what she and Tariq had done was not sinful; that it had been natural, good, beautiful, even inevitable, spurred by the knowledge that they might never see each other again.

At the time we are focusing our efforts primarily on building shelters for refugees. Homelessness in Afghanistan is a huge problem.