Gabriel Garcia Marquez's Classic Romance Novel, "Love in the Time of Cholera"

Dan: Wonderful book by a wonderful author

Germany on Nov 26, 2023

Happy lady: Speedy delivery, always appreciated. The front cover is more worn than expected for the price hence 4 stars. Otherwise, good condition.

United Kingdom on Nov 14, 2023

Raj P Srivastava: Love in the Time of Cholera is Marquez’s greatest work. The most lyrical. The most masterfully written. And, even though it isn’t actually a work of magical-realism that Marquez is so famous for pioneering, it is still, somehow, the most magical. When you finish the book, you will regret leaving its characters, its setting , and its exquisite, flowing words and poetry behind. The sheer beauty of this book can change your life.

United States on Sep 29, 2023

SHIRLEY Mealing: Loved the characters that took time to grow on you. The description of such a different time and place but humans being the same wherever or whenever they may live.

United Kingdom on Sep 02, 2023

J. Austin: After I finished the book and found the ending wanting, I asked myself, what did Márquez wish to accomplish by writing Love in the Time of Cholera? I've decided, in his godless way, he wanted to explore the inconsistencies, weaknesses and occasional beauty of romantic love. Does he accomplish these objectives? Well... (spoilers ahead) - The lives of the antagonist/protagonists feel existentially futile by the end of the novel, and their romance even more so aided by the metaphoric, cadaver-infested Magdalena. Sympathy for the pedophilic Florentino is at an all-time low during the final boat chapter where his fifty-one years-in-the-making romance with Fermina culminates in an uncomfortable bedroom scene and an indefinite journey down the river. Fermina plays her part well and is intelligent and admirable, even caring at times, although not the sharpest cookie during her widowhood. My guess is, if she had known Florentino's obsessive-compulsive means to get her on the boat and his latest affairs with a child who has now committed suicide, she would have in no way consented to let him love her. What kind of love is this anyway??? Even with the awareness that Márquez is using...

United States on Apr 04, 2023

Gregory Stone: Marquez combines the genius of Chaucer's unreliable narrators with Milton's mockery of the epic protagonist. He has even managed to dupe his reviewer into believing in Florentino Ariza's eternal declaration of love for Fermina Daza is praiseworthy! His masterful mockery of that declaration through the unfolding of the story is at least as good as Fitzgerald's flattening of Gatsby's idealist notions of his love under the cold, profane moneyed world of Tom and Daisy. While Fitzgerald flattens idealism, this novel flattens the shallow ego-centric infatuation that many call love in this generation.
A little observation reveals indicators of Marquez’s clear derision of ‘love’:

1) The narrator provides us an unmediated juxtaposition of two contrasting definitions of love: On one side, the narrator praises love as a thread of kindness and companionship woven through a tapestry of misunderstandings, trials, and temptations. Acts of kindness, forgiveness, and sanctification mark the story of Dr. Urbino and Fermina Daza. On the other side, the same narrator praises love as a self-deceived ideal that is essentially projected onto Fermina, without recognition of who she is at...

United States on Dec 09, 2021

Vee: This isn’t a book about love and there isn’t much in it about cholera, other than dead bodies lying around: it is a book about a sex addict, a sexual predator, a stalker who used his obsession with a woman he had never even had a conversation with as an excuse to not develop an adult relationship. He was even described as a “hunter” on his excursions looking for women. Some of Florentino’s behaviour was psychopathic, but the author didn’t have the knowledge or skill to make him consistently so: the book lacked psychological depth, the characters were shallow. The author had absolutely no understanding of female psychology and his main female character’s only redeeming feature was her physical beauty: other than that she was thoroughly bad-tempered.
The book wasn’t believable: Florentino Ariza never ate fruit or vegetables and was constipated (as you’d expect on his diet); he drank 30 cups of coffee a day – so his breath would have stunk and his teeth would have been stained – and yet we’re expected to believe that he managed to attract and seduce over 600 women? Do the maths – even over 50 years, that’s 12 a year, one new woman a month – yet some...

United Kingdom on Apr 01, 2018

Hari Pudipeddi: Okay, I am no one to write a review to this book - nor for any book written - but most of all, above all, this book. So is everyone, i think, but i've read it knowing it is great, lets say, i read it to know how it is a great story, how Marquez is a great writer, and i did just that. I discovered it, all through the book. He is a fiction writer, yeah, but he is a poetic, mystical lyricist, and also a subtle storyteller. His narration is absolutely unconventional and unpredictable. Its a hard book to read, for you know nothing about it, have no idea where the story is headed, no idea where and how the narrative will take a turn, and yet somehow can fell that you know. And you're almost always wrong. In every line, in every word, Marquez surprised me. There is amazing pleasure in reading a story of that kind.
Its a simple love story of love, not a love story nor a romance story. Its a story about love, which is told through the characters. I felt as if the characters were just pawns in telling the tale of a thing called love. And also its a story that treads on the lines of marriage, death, ambition, solitude, compassion, determination, which only take the story of love...

India on Dec 16, 2015