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| The best books on Colombia: start your reading here | The best books on Colombia: start your reading here |
| (5 months later) | |
| One Hundred Years of Solitude, by Gabriel García Márquez | One Hundred Years of Solitude, by Gabriel García Márquez |
| In the best-known – and perhaps most dazzling – novel to come out of Latin America, Colombia's favourite son takes us on a magic carpet ride through his country's turbulent past. | In the best-known – and perhaps most dazzling – novel to come out of Latin America, Colombia's favourite son takes us on a magic carpet ride through his country's turbulent past. |
| Historical fact is liberally mixed with fantasy in a saga that spans six generations of the Buendia family. The Buendias have great strengths as well as fatal flaws, which play out in the rise and fall of the mythical town of Macondo in the South American jungle. Macondo, "an intricate stew of truth and mirages", bears more than a passing resemblance to the author's own home town of Aracataca on the Colombian coast. | Historical fact is liberally mixed with fantasy in a saga that spans six generations of the Buendia family. The Buendias have great strengths as well as fatal flaws, which play out in the rise and fall of the mythical town of Macondo in the South American jungle. Macondo, "an intricate stew of truth and mirages", bears more than a passing resemblance to the author's own home town of Aracataca on the Colombian coast. |
| In this sweep of history as seen through the eyes of a single family – all of whose males are named Arcadio or Aureliano – civil war rages, lives are lost, hearts break and dreams shatter. The looping chronology, along with generations of Buendias sharing names and characteristics, gives us history as a story of repetition and return. That keeps readers on their toes in this enthralling and highly comic novel. | In this sweep of history as seen through the eyes of a single family – all of whose males are named Arcadio or Aureliano – civil war rages, lives are lost, hearts break and dreams shatter. The looping chronology, along with generations of Buendias sharing names and characteristics, gives us history as a story of repetition and return. That keeps readers on their toes in this enthralling and highly comic novel. |
| With this book, the master of magic realism took a giant step towards winning the Nobel prize for literature in 1982. | With this book, the master of magic realism took a giant step towards winning the Nobel prize for literature in 1982. |
| Delirium, by Laura Restrepo | Delirium, by Laura Restrepo |
| Restrepo sets her novel in the drug-fuelled 1980s heyday of cocaine king Pablo Escobar, and uses insanity in one family to reflect the collective insanity of her native Colombia. Aguilar, a grizzled, leftwing literature professor who is reduced to selling dog food to make ends meet, returns from a business trip to find that his beautiful wife, Agustina, has gone mad. In his search for the causes of her delirium, he uncovers secrets and lies from her troubled past. | Restrepo sets her novel in the drug-fuelled 1980s heyday of cocaine king Pablo Escobar, and uses insanity in one family to reflect the collective insanity of her native Colombia. Aguilar, a grizzled, leftwing literature professor who is reduced to selling dog food to make ends meet, returns from a business trip to find that his beautiful wife, Agustina, has gone mad. In his search for the causes of her delirium, he uncovers secrets and lies from her troubled past. |
| This complex and captivating novel uses the voices of Agustina, her husband, her father and a former lover – Midas McAlister, a flamboyant money-launderer and drug trafficker – to give an account of a Colombia in thrall to narco-capitalism and battered by violence and corruption. The story mostly takes place in the capital, Bogotá, which Aguilar describes as a city "where everyone's at war with everyone else". | This complex and captivating novel uses the voices of Agustina, her husband, her father and a former lover – Midas McAlister, a flamboyant money-launderer and drug trafficker – to give an account of a Colombia in thrall to narco-capitalism and battered by violence and corruption. The story mostly takes place in the capital, Bogotá, which Aguilar describes as a city "where everyone's at war with everyone else". |
| Restrepo has a sharp eye for exposing the hypocrisies and class divisions that dog Colombian society, and memorably depicts the period's excesses. Yet, through this morass, the novel remarkably ends on a note that is, if not quite happy, at least hopeful. | Restrepo has a sharp eye for exposing the hypocrisies and class divisions that dog Colombian society, and memorably depicts the period's excesses. Yet, through this morass, the novel remarkably ends on a note that is, if not quite happy, at least hopeful. |
| Short Walks from Bogotá: Journeys in the New Colombia, by Tom Feiling | Short Walks from Bogotá: Journeys in the New Colombia, by Tom Feiling |
| Feiling points out that Colombia is the worst place in the world to be a trade unionist, and that its army is one of the worst human rights abusers in the western hemisphere. Yet it is Washington's closest ally in Latin America and the biggest recipient of US military aid. Bizarrely, one of the world's most unequal countries is also one of its happiest. | Feiling points out that Colombia is the worst place in the world to be a trade unionist, and that its army is one of the worst human rights abusers in the western hemisphere. Yet it is Washington's closest ally in Latin America and the biggest recipient of US military aid. Bizarrely, one of the world's most unequal countries is also one of its happiest. |
| With a book on the cocaine trade and a documentary about Colombia already under his belt, Feiling is well placed to unpick the country's complexities. He finds Colombia trying hard to transform itself after decades of violence and being at the heart of the drugs trade. | With a book on the cocaine trade and a documentary about Colombia already under his belt, Feiling is well placed to unpick the country's complexities. He finds Colombia trying hard to transform itself after decades of violence and being at the heart of the drugs trade. |
| Now what was once dubbed a "narco-state" is one of the region's fastest-growing economies and a darling of foreign investors. Although it hasn't quite segued from "terrorism to tourism", as claimed by hardline former president Álvaro Uribe, there are reasons to be optimistic about the future. | Now what was once dubbed a "narco-state" is one of the region's fastest-growing economies and a darling of foreign investors. Although it hasn't quite segued from "terrorism to tourism", as claimed by hardline former president Álvaro Uribe, there are reasons to be optimistic about the future. |
| By walking in urban and rural areas once closed off by the violence, talking with Colombians, and maintaining an unflinching eye, Feiling is able to offer us a deft and enlightening introduction to this vibrant country. | By walking in urban and rural areas once closed off by the violence, talking with Colombians, and maintaining an unflinching eye, Feiling is able to offer us a deft and enlightening introduction to this vibrant country. |
| • Read the first in our series, on Nigeria, here | • Read the first in our series, on Nigeria, here |
| Write your review of this or any other book, find out what other readers thought or add it to your lists | Write your review of this or any other book, find out what other readers thought or add it to your lists |
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