"That was a long time ago, but it's wrong what they say about the past, I've learned, about how you can bury it. Because the past claws its way out."

“She was leaving the world as woman who had loved and been loved back. She was leaving it as a friend, a companion, a guardian. A mother. A person of consequence at last. No. It was not so bad, Mariam thought, that she should die this way. Not so bad.”

“It was Homaira and me against the world. ... In the end, the world always wins. That's just the way of things.”

“Khaled Hosseini's Official Website”

“I ran. A grown man running with a swarm of screaming children. But I didn't care. I ran with the wind blowing in my face, and a smile as wide as the valley of Panjsher on my lips. I ran.”

“Regret...when it comes to you, I have oceans of it.”

“I think that everything he did, feeding the poor, giving money to friends in need, it was all a way of redeeming himself. And that, I believe, is what true redemption is, Amir jan, when guilt leads to good.”