One Hundred Years of Solitude
Gabriel Garcia Marquez
Blackstone Audio
14:04:14 hours
Narrated by John Lee
One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel García Márquez
My rating: 2 of 5 stars
🌟🌟
Classic, Magical Realism
Synopsis:
Story of the Buendia family in the mythical town of Macondo. It follows the lives of seven generations, their successes and failures, children and deaths. When Jose Arcadio Buendia and Ursula Iguaran his wife and cousin, leave Columbia and set out to find their utopia. After having a dream one night one their journey, Jose establishes the town of Macondo.
Over the years, the town becomes exposed to the outside world and eventually is brought to ruin. The Buendia family may have been cursed after all, as predicted by Ursula in the very beginning.
My thoughts:
I am sorry to say but I found this book to be boring. I struggled to follow along with so many people with the same names. I Googled a family tree for it so that I could have anything to help keep them straight but it was still difficult. Ultamately I struggle with books built upon symbolism. I read books for the enjoyment and not necessarily to promote deep thinking. I like deep feeling, ones that bring out emotions and make you analyze what you are feeling or cause unexpected feelings. I don’t want to have to interpret every little thing throughout to discover their true meaning. “The ghosts are symbols of the past and the haunting nature it has over Macondo.”
However, I can see why this is a Classic for sure and why so many people love it. It has some great magical realism throughout. My favorite was Remedios the Beauty, said to be the most beautiful woman on Macondo. She is thought to be cursed, unintentionally causing the death of several men who lust after/love her. One man falling to his death after watching her bath. Instead of blood escaping his body it was an amber colored oil that smelled of Remedios the Beauty.
