I finished reading “And the Mountains echoed”, a book that I first read in December at my University Library. Someone here enjoyed it enough to add to the miscellaneous section of a bookshelf otherwise reserved for Taxonomy and research history.

Firstly, it was a novel about broken people. Everyone in the story was stolen from, lied to, or limited in some way that severely damaged their remaining relationships or perceptions of their lives.

There was a major theme of parent/child relationships, some of which would be reconciled decades later at the very end or never at all, like a last laugh or festering wound. Many events occurred relating to ideas such as unconditional love or shame of ugliness or beauty. Is a child meant to be raised in the image of a parent or independent? Is the purpose of a child to repay their parent when he or she has aged and requires assisted living, or can they be left to their own life? There is no answer a parent can give to what is best for your child, you can only encourage healthy eating, a responsibility against ignorance, and to assess yourself honestly.

Some of these relationships ended as well as they could. Most of them in fact, went as best as they could. I could say an important theme to conclude the story was “It is never too late to find yourself”.

It was an intense book that has been on my mind all this time, and the fact that an english version was here at a small research station 40 kilometers from the nearest town is something I would not attribute to coincidence. I was meant to finish this book!