Point of View

Thousand Splendid Suns is told by an omniscient narrator who knows the past and the future and the characters' thoughts. He does not have a definite personality - he is not a specific person, who is telling this story for reasons that matter in a world outside of the story itself. He is merely a storyteller, telling the story for its own sake, creating characters and describing them to the reader for the reader's entertainment and education.

The characters themselves provide a couple of points of view - Miriam and Laila are both children when they are introduced, and their growth and maturation, and the eventual intersection and interdependence of their lives takes the reader on a journey from childhood to maturity, from innocence and ignorance and powerlessness to action and guilt and consequences. Things that are just background to the children become more important as...