And the Mountains Echoed

It is the title of a book I just finished, 15 minutes ago? If the book is some sort of illness, I would have not recovered from it. If it is some sort of sadness, I am still dwelling, helplessly. I had the tendency to compare it with A Splendid Thousand Suns as they were from the same author. Yet, this is, at least for me, a haunting end, a finality with which I can't seem to make peace. I can't say it is a sad ending, they found each other, didn't they? Brutally honest, as the review says. Bogging down the fairy tale of the reunion is the weight of reality permeating from the fate of each and every character. It spells regret for Nabi, for Markos, for Idris. It spells disillusion for Nila. For Pari, yes both of them, and Abdullah, I cried the most, as I was supposed to I guess. The author best sums it up while describing the bridge in a French children song, and definitely more than just that, "Like it reached, tried to reunite with, the other side and fell short". Yes, the ending fell short. It is just like for many, or even for all of us, in one way or another, reality fell short of our hopes and dreams. But the beauty of life lies in that shortfall of reality, for no one and nothing can stop us from dreaming big and hoping beyond.

Perhaps the mountains echoed so that Abdullah and Pari can find each other, after decades and miles of separation? Perhaps the mountains echoed like how our parents' lives, their hopes and dreams, their fulfilment and disappointment, all have bearings on what sort of person we are going to be, what sort of lives we are going to lead? Perhaps the mountains echoed because tiny little details or narratives of this story, whose setting may be strangely distant to many of us as readers, may find resonance in our souls? 

Regardless, the mountains will echo ...