A strong streak of betrayal runs throughout The Kite Runner. Because Hassan is presented as a profoundly good person, it is unexpected that he will be hurt—much less killed—before Amir can make amends. This subversion of expectations by way of betrayal is foreshadowed early on, when Rahim Khan tells Amir in a letter that good stories have irony. This letter comes after Amir has written his first short story, the tale of a man who kills his wife to draw pearls from his tears. The irony at work in Amir’s short story is the same irony at work in his real-world betrayal of Hassan, which correlates directly to Baba’s own secret betrayal of Ali a decade earlier. 

In The Kite Runner, irony is used to imply fate at work or predeterminism—

unending cycles that bring characters full circle. These characters often face recreations of their hidden betrayals or ironic rearrangements of them. When Amir betrays Hassan, avoiding a physical confrontation with Assef, he is forced by extenuating circumstances to meet a grown Assef in combat years later. When Baba betrays Ali by sleeping with Sanaubar, he sets events in motion that cascade and refract forward throughout the lives of both his children.