Some of these memories found their way into ``The Kite Runner,'' Hosseini's 2003 novel about childhood friends Amir and Hassan, bound by a love of kite fighting, torn by the antipathy of the Pashtun (Sunni Muslims) ruling class for the Hazaras (Shiite) underclass. Forbidden under Taliban rule, kites returned to the skies over Kabul in 2001, when the fundamentalist regime fell to the Northern Alliance. Hence, their importance in Afghan culture: They've come to symbolize deliverance from cruel oppression, spiritual rebirth. San Jose Mercury News 2.19.06

My favorite book in this short 2006, The Kite Runner, is, as I've just learned and am proud to say, written by a local who went to my high school! The main character in his story also went to San Jose State, as well! It is an amazing book about the realities of lives we may not, as a society, widely know, and simply a story about being human. Check it out.