One Hundred Years of Solitude (Cien años de soledad) by Gabriel García Márquez

I've read this book, in Serbian (or was it Croatian?) translation when I was in 9th grade and it remained my favorite book for several years after.  This is the first time I am re-reading it in English translation, and some of the finesses of the language and the phrasing seem to have been lost in translation.  My Spanish is far from fluent, unfortunately, and I cannot read it in original (one day!), but I like the Slavic languages translation better, as those languages are closer in spirit and form to Spanish and less is lost during the translation.

What can be said about Cien años de soledad that has not already been said?  Marquez received a Nobel prize in literature and not in small measure because of this book.  It is one of the most amazing books you will ever read - not in a cheap thriller/mystery/romance way like current pulp fiction - but in a way that makes you see your life and the life of people around you.  The big things seem trivial, like the massacre of the 3,000 people at the train station in Macondo by the corrupt government's army, while the small things are magical, like the hive of yellow butterflies following Babylonia.

Jose Arcadio Buendia founds Macondo after he kills a man during a cock fight in the previous place he used to live with his wife Ursula.  Macondo is found after passing a magical area on the way out of Riohacha and north of the swamp areas.   The 100 years between the founding and the destruction of Macondo are the subject of the book, and in some way the town of Macondo is the main character of the book.

Macondo is a place where magic is found in the small things, like the magic that the travelling gypsies brought early on, especially the intriguing mystic Melquíades who teaches Jose Arcadio Buendia alchemy.  The sons of the Buendia family are called either Jose Arcadio or Aureliano.  And Colonel Aureliano fought 31 civil wars and lost them all.  Then we have Remedios the Beauty who is so unworldly beautiful that she ascends to heaven in her corporeal body.  And finally Amaranta-Ursula and Aureliano Babylonia who finish the 100 year cycle when their incest baby dies and is eaten by ants, while they both die in the final disaster of humongous wind destroying the entire town.

In between are the evil Americans with the Banana Company which destroys the life of the people in Macondo but is staunchly defended by the corrupt and evil government, who'd rather see thousands of people die at the American plantation than lose the bribes they received, even going so far as to claim in court that the company never existed and neither did the people who worked there and were murdered in the strike against the horrible working conditions.

This is a mind-blowing book that every human should read at least once in their lifetime.