One Hundred Years of Solitude

Customer Reviews

• A Masterwork  Feb 21, 2008 (4 of 4 found this helpful)

  I'm not sure I would classify this book as one of my favorites, and yet it is entirely profound. Written in a beautiful style that is amazingly complex at the same time it is beautifully simple, One Hundred Years of Solitude reveals a true mastery of composition. The themes are as grotesque as they are beautiful, realistic and at the same time fantastical, bright and full of hope and at the same time cast in a hopeless darkness. Definitely worth reading.

• Creative Mastery  Sep 5, 2006 (6 of 7 found this helpful)

  I truly cannot remember the last time I have read something so imaginitive and insightful. While this book is sure to make you laugh, the wisdom imparted through hysterical and fantastic happenings is almost chilling at times. This book reminds me of Voltaire's "Candide," in that it takes a satirical tone towards the human race. A piece of advice: Definitely read this book at a time when you won't have to take too much time away from it. The character list is long, and it can be difficult to become reoriented. A perfect vacation read!

• A House of Mirrors for Humanity  Sep 15, 2008 (2 of 2 found this helpful)

  If you understand "house of mirrors" is the name of the town, and you understand that each generation repeats the errors and mistakes of the past, and Melquiades, and the inventions, and the click-clocking of the bones in the wall, and the magical realism, and the cyclical pattern of the stories, and the corkscrew tail of a pig on a wailing child being carried off into the jungle by ants, you will get this story. There is a reason this book won the Nobel Prize for Literature. This is a book for lovers of literature, for those who search the world for meaning. Amazing. Blinding in its beauty and brilliance. A sheer joy to read.

• Great literature does not get lost in translation  Jun 16, 2009 (1 of 1 found this helpful)

  This book was a bit of a slow start for me, but once it got ahold, it wouldn't let go; I couldn't wait to come upon the next marvelous insight or memorable phrase like "he had peeped into the abyss of greatness" or "children inherit their parents' madnesses." There were no characters quite up there in the first tier of fictional acquaintances in my memory (hence four stars instead of five), but I left this book with reinvigorated faith in the ability of literature to transcend geography and time, the good judgment of the Nobel literary committee, and the conviction that the best fiction can teach us more than life itself.

• The best book I have ever read, however...  Feb 18, 2009 (1 of 1 found this helpful)

  I read it in Spanish since is my native language, and it's a beautiful book. I have read like three times. However if you are a native English speaker the traslation may not cause the same effect to you and might find it very difficult. It really is a challenge to read tis book.