i took my time reading this one; it worked so well for Middlemarch!

four stars for how, over almost a month, the house in macondo became real to me.

(it probably goes without saying that i was entirely living for the handful of exquisitely grotesque descriptions Marquez pulled off. the problem is, the way i love the thrill of revulsion is to laugh my idiot head off, which kinda takes me out of the narrative. i know, i know: how convenient for cowardly prudish bougie me.) ( )

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This book is all over the place, so it is very difficult for me to review. Firstly, I needed a family history chart to read the book. Many male children had the same exact name as their father, for generations. I started out listening to this on audio, but had to also get the book to follow along as just listening was not enough to keep my thoughts organized. Yes, Marquez won the Pulitzer Prize for this book. But is it readable? Is it enjoyable? Both negatives for me! I guess at the core of my dislike is the magical realism. It is a very pessimistic book set in the "fictional" town of Maconda for 100 years. Maconda is both desolate and also a very busy town with the banana plantation and the uprising of the slaves. The theme of this book, according to Tess, is the futility of life. If you are upset by pedophilia, incest, child abuse, rape, prostitution, and bestiality, just to name a few, this book is not for you! ( )

i am sad ( )

Ok…I don’t know. Everything I read and hear is about how amazing this book is and how it is one of the most influential literary works of our time and it won Nobel prizes, and it and the Bible should be required reading, and on and on and on. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, I just don’t understand what makes a book a classic. It was good, it was interesting, it was packed to the gills with details, which sometimes make it hard to follow, especially since everyone had the same name (overgeneralization, I know) but I don’t understand what makes it great. I definitely had a hard time getting into it, and the fact that it took me 8 days to finish should say enough. (Books I love generally take me 3-4 days). I just don’t know… ( )