This Just In From Oprah

Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel Garcia Marquez is the newest Oprah’s Book Club selection. Set in the Caribbean coast of South America, spanning multiple years, filled with a type of romance and beautifully written. And, yet, I have never been able to finish it. Ever.

I really want to read this book and, I swear, one day I will persevere, but I never make it past page 20 or so. I have started it so many times that I have basically memorized the opening sentence (which, I think, is one of the best lines ever written):

“It was inevitable: the scent of bitter almonds always reminded him of the fate of unrequited love.” (3)

It is the same story with 100 Years of Solitude by the same author (Oprah’s 2004 selection). But, worse, in the case of 100 Years of Solitude I have started it twice as many times!