Rating: 
Summary: Minority of One?
Review: I guess I'm the only one having trouble reading this book, let alone getting through it. I'm about a third of the way through it and about to give it up for now. I love anything I've read by Gabriel Garcia Marquez, but that doesn't mean that I'm going to accept this book without question. Ok, sure, we can say that he plays with time and space, and even allow him poetic license to forget the facts once in awhile. But then, I could do that with a senile grandfather too. After awhile as much as you love him, it gets tiresome. I for one just can't keep track of anything he says. So, what's the point? If the point is that we aren't necessarily the agents for our own factful biography, fine. But other writers have done this in novel form (including Senor Marquez) and I find it a dubious prospect to be doing it in a supposedly factual autobiographical form. But even allowing for *that*, what's the point then of deluging us with so many different characters to keep track of if they are also going to be popping in and out of an out-of-sequence chronology. It only ends up testing us for no reason. If nothing else, perhaps an index of characters would have been nice. (There's a map, so why not a similar character map?) I started losing it after finding myself repeatedly going back some pages to remind myself just who this "Alfredo" was or who that "Ramon" was. This book has taught me one thing: loving a person's writing doesn't necessarily mean you need to know everything about them. And Gabriel Garcia Marquez makes it feel like you are getting everything, factual or not.
Rating: 
Summary: Unmagical Surrealism
Review: I have always felt somewhat underwhelmed by Marquez's writing, and his "autobiography" is no exception. His great shortcoming, as he himself admits both tacitly and directly, is that he is a master of style but not substance. The less than consequential events that litter this often meandering and aimless account of a writer's life confirm this. Little more remains in my mind than the impression of a man born to write, a man who never once veered from the path he knew he was born to travel. For me, the most true and telling scene comes late in the book, when a female companion laughingly tells Marquez that he will never know himself. In fact, nothing is clearer than this after 450 pages. We come away knowing little of Marquez other than that he was a gifted, precocious, neglectful, and shy young man. The world he evokes for us evaporates in the subtropical heat as soon as we snap the book shut. The historical events that supposedly influenced the life of the author remain as much a mystery to me as when I began reading the book. I can only conclude that the writer himself is mystified by them as well. The problem, as again the author himself notes (perhaps not so lacking in self-awareness after all?), is that for Marquez fiction and nonfiction are one and the same. His world is a magical invention of the mind, not a place where cold facts are brought into alignment by a rational process of the intellect. This is fine and dandy, and makes for nice reading when your narrator is as talented as Marquez, but ultimately I found myself craving a more coherent worldview, something to link the tangled snarl of events together. Marquez's world is at times vivid, but he is a poet of the clouds, not of the dense, dark stuff that reality often is. It annoyed me to hear about the incredibly frequent infamous meetings of Marquez and his friends in which they discussed their rich and varied ideas on art, politics and life. But where are those ideas? Not in this book. It is still at times a great pleasure to read. The lyricism of Marquez's narrative style shines through even in translation, though surely the translator, Grossman, deserves an equal share of the praise for this. As others have noted, the book could have benefited from the red ink of the editor's pen (Marquez's archenemy). But then, who among us is worthy of editing "the Maestro's" text?
Rating:
Summary: The book is a bore
Review: I love Garcia Marquez's fiction and was looking forward to reading the first installment of his autobiography. But I couldn't finish it, and I certainly won't be bothering with the next two.
While there are some intriguing parts, overall this book was deadly boring and extremely hard to follow. It reminded me of someone giving a speech after accepting a lifetime achievement award: "And I'd like to thank Fred and George and Jim and Bob and a whole bunch of other people you don't care about..."
I managed to plod through about two-thirds of it before I stopped punishing myself and put it aside. Unless you're a love-blinded fan who's going to adore anything he writes, don't waste your time and money.
Rating: 
Summary: A delightful introduction to a literary master
Review: I must confess that I have not read any Garcia Marquez and thought I'd use his memoir as an introduction. I'm glad I did. I look forward to adding his novels to my reading list. Where this book was most successful for me was in its ability to re-create an era in a country that to most of the world is best known for its bloody revolutionary past (and current state). While Marquez gives a bird's-eye view of Colombia's troubled political history, he also paints a vivid account of Colombia's thriving artistic community - its salons, sidewalk cafes, and colorful literary personages. His narrative voice is sharply observant, yet warmly inviting, filled with personality and a healthy dose of wry humor. My only criticism is that at times the narrative seems to get a little repetitive and the lineage of Colombian politicians can be a bit dense if you don't have a previous famliarity with it. Now, on to the novels...
Rating: 
Summary: Masterpiece by the Master
Review: I tore through this book, veraciously reading and re-reading passages. It is a masterpiece, from the master. It is magical in every sense, in that it effortlessly conjures and creates real worlds of merriment, intrigue, and fascination...out of ink and paper! Because it is based in love, when all is said and done, it is an epic human achievement. Don Gabriel-- if you ever read this, know that you and your compassionate wisdom have been the captain of my soul for fully half my life. Your writing is utterly spellbinding, and this book is --so far!--your life's crowing achievement. I just flat-out loved this book.
Rating:
Summary: The Tell was already told..
Review: I was so happy when I bought the book because I am a forever fan of Garcia Marquez, I was thinking that he was going to tell the things that influence or motivate him to write, or even the story of his life, and on the contrary, he just pick up lines of his books and tried to collage them into this new one. The reading was very hard to follow, I just felt asleep so many times, it was the same as when we are kids and our granpas tell us the same stories over and over.
Rating:
Summary: Marquez blind
Review: If almost all the literary world agrees that Gabriel Garcia Marquez is one of the world's great writers then it must be right. If all of the literary world or most of it believes that this first installment of Marquez's autobiography is a work of genius that illuminates the human condition in a magical and mysterious way then it must perceive something that I do not. I do not find myself fascinated by the kinds of relationships and people that Marquez describes here. I do not find them to have inner depth or complexity. I do not feel a pulsing beauty of language as I do with Faulkner a writer Marquez has been inspired by and is often compared to. I find the world of Marquez and the kinds of human connections it displays alien to me and my own perhaps more limited more perspective in terms of human loyalty and responsibility. I do not get the ' characters' in a real way.
I suppose what I am saying is that I am not certain that my own reading of Marquez is anything other than a mistaken misperception of a very limited in this case reader. I therefore would strongly recommend that anyone who reads this review have a look at those most enthusiastically appreciative of the work.
Rating:
Summary: And what a tale to tell!
Review: In this wonderful autobiography of one of the world's greatest authors, the reader is treated to the same rich language, vivid descriptions, and colorful characters that have graced so much of Gabriel Garcia Marquez' fiction. Marquez was born in 1927, the eldest of 11 children. However, the story begins when Marquez is a young man returning to one of his Caribbean hometowns with his mother in an attempt to sell their old house. This trip evokes many childhood memories for Marquez, who then floats back and forth in time from his birth and early childhood to his days as a young man starting as a writer. These temporal shifts are easy for the reader to follow as Marquez writes about people and events in childhood that would later shape both his career and his choices as a young man. Sometimes it is difficult to follow the many characters that appear only from time to time and I think at one point I counted six different grandmothers, but the important people in his life are given such description and background that they are eminently memorable.
His tales of the members of his family reads like one of his fictional Macondo families, right down to his grandfather - the Colonel, and one of his sisters who for years ate nothing but dirt and soil. We meet many interesting characters that shaped his life and inspired him. Like the sisters who were invalids from birth yet were renowned for teaching dance classes. Or the early lover who taught Gabito how to study in school - and would in fact withhold meetings with him if he got bad marks at school.
The surreal and magical realism of his fiction are also embedded here, but we, the readers, are expected to wink conspiratorially with Marquez and continue reading. The autobiography can also be read as odes and lamentations to his native Colombia. For those readers who have never been to Colombia, we are treated to rich descriptions of the country and the differences between those from the Caribbean and those from the urban centers of Bogota. Marquez does not shy from discussing the politics of his country, his own personal politics, and his difficulty with censorship after the Patso coup in 1944. Marquez then takes us back to Baranquilla as a struggling writer and write up to the time he meets his wife.
Edith Grossman's translation conveys Marquez' rich language and imagery as much as it does in her translations of some of his novels. Living To Tell The Tale is the first of an intended three-part autobiography. I anxiously await the next two volumes to see more of what shaped the man into the writer. Highly recommended.
Rating:
Summary: Fan Of Memoirs
Review: Lillian Hunter,
Fan Of Memoirs
What a beautifully poignant memoir this is. Everyone should read this book. It is so beautifully written, I can not say enough wonderful words. Also recommended: Other Memoirs: Nightmares Echo by Katlyn Stewart,Lost Boy by David Pelzer,Beauty For Ashes by Joyce Meyer
Rating:
Summary: A glutonous smorgasboard for Gabito fans!
Review: Living to Tell the Tale is like winning the lottery for Gabriel Garcia Marquez lovers. After drifting off to Maconda, or agonizing over the long love affair in Love in the Time of Cholera, or being spirited off to so many of the places in his stories, Marquez gives his readers the oft-denied chance to peek into the true-life origins of his characters, locations and story-lines. Absolutely fascinating and wonderful. I'd be hard-pressed to suggest reading this first, only because the magic of his previous works are so wild and fabulous - reading that reality had some part of those stories might detract from the magic. Nevertheless, this is a stand alone work.
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