I have come across a new way to get into a book. I started reading Love in the Time of Cholera two weeks ago and kept putting it down, happy to read anything else if it would save me from the trudging toil of reading this. But then I said sternly to myself "Marquez is a genius. You LOVED Memories of My Melancholy Whores. You SALIVATED over One Hundred Years of Solitude. GET IT TOGETHER."So I read the last page. And then the second last page. And then the third last page. And then I skipped to the beginning of the last chapter. THEN I was having so much fun I read the entire book like that... chapter by chapter.
Admittedly I remain a little confused. I believe I missed some vital moments doing this, and I sort of destroyed the flow of Marquez's words. But I quite enjoyed the novel regardless!! It's a very sad tale of an unrequited love that rights itself in the end, with beautiful writing and gorgeous descriptions.
Just... a little TOO much on the descriptions Marquez. I mean, listen, you're a Nobel Prize winning novelist and if you want to put them in then I guess it's your call, but I didn't really need all the anecdotes on the pureed eggplant and the boots and the godfather's chronic constipation.
ALSO, I don't want to read about love that takes half a century to find fulfillment, only to have Florentino (the guy) complain that his lady love (Fermina) smells old: "...she had the sour smell of old age... It was the smell of human fermentation."
SWOON.
Otherwise, thumbs up Marqy Marq.
Rating: 8/10.
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