Complex sentence: The news "struck a personal chord" for him, as he had grown up with the sport while living in Afghanistan, and motivated him to write a 25-page short story about two boys who fly kites in Kabul.
Split into simpler sentences: The news "struck a personal chord" for him, as he had grown up with the sport while living in Afghanistan. He was motivated to write a 25-page short story about two boys who fly kites in Kabul.