Thanks for the recommendations! As I spent this weekend on a little solo road trip/vacation, I had a lot of time on my own and did a lot of reading. I could seriously spend my life reading (and listening to books on cd, as it were). My favorite? The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini. Talk about a heart-wrenching story. And I loved listening to it, especially with all of the Farsi that I would have slaughtered had I read it on my own. Not only was the story beautiful, but Hosseini does an amazing job telling it. I loved his use of rhetorical devices. The imagery was so beautiful. I laughed and cried. I seriously feel like a better person for having “read” this book.
I can’t wait to read his second book, A Thousand Splendid Suns.
existential dilemmas 
I just finished that book this weekend. It really was so great…heartbreaking, but great. Good call on listening to it on CD, especially with the Farsi. I should try that sometime.
I definitely need to read this. I read a magazine article the other day where the writer referred to himself as the only person in the country who hadn’t read Kite Runner yet… that’s kind of how I feel.