As we are nearly done with winter, I am almost ashamed to admit that I am still working on this past summer’s summer reading list.

Almost.

We all know I read far too many books at one time, but it’s not like I’m going to stop any time soon. It is what it is my friends.

So, I am indeed still working my way through those books, but I am happy to say I had some down time recently to finish Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s One Hundred Years of Solitude.

Marquez, who passed away in April of 2014, was a Colombian novelist perhaps best known for this book as well as Love in the Time of Cholera. (I’ve also read that book, and would urge you to pick up a copy. It is lovely and sad all at once, and full of Marquez’s lush and evocative imagery.)

One Hundred Years of Solitude was first published in 1967, but its widespread critical acclaim and global popularity were major factors in his receiving the 1982 Nobel Prize for Literature.

This book tells the story of the rise and fall of the town of Macondo, an isolated outpost in colonial Latin America. Tucked away in the Colombian jungle, the town prospers under the leadership of the Buendia family. As time and generations pass, so do the family’s good standing and power. They fall prey to their own selfishness and lust, whether it be for other people, wealth, luxury, or even knowledge (several characters spend the majority of their lives locked up in a dark room with a bunch of parchments).

The town and its people are fictional, but to me the hallmark of Marquez’s style has always been its vibrancy, and it is especially on display in this book. The immediacy of his descriptions pulled me right into the time and place he creates with Macondo.

This is a book you can sink your teeth into; not something you can knock off in an evening and a few cups of tea. There are creation and national myths throughout, as well as religious, philosophical, and literary metaphors. Time is also a tricky thing throughout. The only other work I can call to mind where time is more fluid is A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Believe me, that is saying something.

This was the second work of Marquez’s that I have read, but I am sure it will not be the last. My only regret is that I did not have the privilege of reading more World Literature when I was in school, because now I have so much lost time to make up for.