One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel García Márquez Published 10 Years Ago Today

Last updated 7/6/2020.

One Hundred Years of Solitude Gabriel García Márquez

First Publication: May 30, 1967 Category: magic realism novel Sales: 50 million

Accolades (click on badges to see full lists):

About the Book: One Hundred Years of Solitude is “The greatest moment in magical realist fiction” TG and “one of the 20th century’s enduring works,” BN “García Márquez's passionate, humorous history of Macondo and its founding family, the Buendías, has the seductive power of myth.” TG “Alternately reverential and comical, [it] weaves the political, personal, and spiritual to bring a new consciousness to storytelling. Translated into dozens of languages, this stunning work is no less than an accounting of the history of the human race.” BN “Solitude tells the story of the rise and fall, birth and death of the mythical town of Macondo through the history of the Buendia family. Inventive, amusing, magnetic, sad, and alive with unforgettable men and women – brimming with truth, compassion, and a lyrical magic that strikes the soul – this novel is a masterpiece in the art of fiction.” AZ “It is a rich and brilliant chronicle of life and death, and the tragicomedy of humankind. In the noble, ridiculous, beautiful, and tawdry story of the Buendía family, one sees all of humanity, just as in the history, myths, growth, and decay of Macondo, one sees all of Latin America.” BN “Love and lust, war and revolution, riches and poverty, youth and senility - the variety of life, the endlessness of death, the search for peace and truth - these universal themes dominate the novel. Whether he is describing an affair of passion or the voracity of capitalism and the corruption of government, Gabriel García Márquez always writes with the simplicity, ease, and purity that are the mark of a master.” BN Resources and Related Links: AZ Amazon BN Barnes & Noble Prezi.com “Buendía Family Tree” Sparknotes.com “Character list” Sparknotes.com “Plot Overview” TG Telegraph: The Perfect Library

In July 2018, I became the organizer of the Classic Novels Book Club. Check out the Book Club tab here or Meetup for more information. This is our November 2018 book.

Virginia Woolf 's To the Lighthouse published 50 years ago today

First posted 7/3/2020; last updated 7/5/2020.

To the Lighthouse Virginia Woolf

First Publication: May 5, 1927 Category: modernism novel Sales: ?

Accolades (click on badges to see full lists):

About the Book: “Radiant as [To the Lighthouse] is in its beauty, there could never be a mistake about it: here is a novel to the last degree severe and uncompromising. I think that beyond being about the very nature of reality, it is itself a vision of reality.” – Eudora Welty, from the Introduction AZ “The serene and maternal Mrs. Ramsay, the tragic yet absurd Mr. Ramsay, and their children and assorted guests are on holiday on the Isle of Skye. From the seemingly trivial postponement of a visit to a nearby lighthouse, Woolf constructs a remarkable, moving examination of the complex tensions and allegiances of family life and the conflict between men and women.” AZ “Following and extending the tradition of modernist novelists like Marcel Proust and James Joyce, the plot of To the Lighthouse is secondary to its philosophical introspection. Cited as a key example of the literary technique of multiple focalization, the novel includes little dialogue and almost no action; most of it is written as thoughts and observations. The novel recalls childhood emotions and highlights adult relationships. Among the book's many tropes and themes are those of loss, subjectivity, the nature of art and the problem of perception.” WK Resources and Related Links: AZ Amazon WK Wikipedia