The first time I heard of Gabriel Garcia Marquez was through a friend of mine in High School. Emman, introduced me to a lot of books and one of which was Marquez's ubiquitous and renowned "Ons Hundred Years of Solitude". It was a year after being introduced to his works that I finally picked up his novel. Little did I know that I would struggle reading his book. Marquez has a very vivid imagination and a random stream of consciousness that gives the average reader a headache or a feeling of despair. It was the latter for me, with the last one hundred pages to go, I quit and shelved Marquez's book.
After shelving Marquez it would take me another year to revisit him again. But always with the same results and this time with an increasing number of pages before I reach the end. Inevitably I gave up and decided not to pursue the story of the Buendia family in the fictional town of Macondo.
Thanks to the internet I would revisit him once again. At that time, this was early 2008, I saw the trailer of Love in the Time of Cholera. The story and my fascination with Marquez was strong. Eventually I bought the book and read it. Once again I was stumped with his language, his writing and I realized that I would never be able to finish his two books.
Nevertheless I am still proud that for once in my life I picked up Gabriel Garcia Marquez's book when he was alive. Even in his death I will and shall remember him as the author whom I tried but so frustratingly never got around to finishing. No regrets and thank you, thank you very much for the literary journey Gabriel Garcia Marquez. You will be sorely missed, thank you for living on in our literary memories.