by Samuel LosadaGarcía Márquez: Forty years of Companionship. Towards the end of 1975, soon after I turned 20, the beautiful colombian girl who had been my lover for a few precious months, gave me – by way of consolation for ending our relationship – One Hundred Years of Solitude. "Read this", she said, "and you will understand my country and why everyone at home is talking about Gabo".At first the book did little to comfort my insatiable longing for her. Its narrative seemed as impenetrable as the mountains and swamps that José Arcadio Buendía tries to cross in search of the sea before founding Macondo.I had not the patience for this journey except that in the final pages, an erotic encounter between Amaranta Ursula and Aureliano evoked a peculiar yearning which still troubles my memory nearly 40 years on. I could not at the time face the fact that this writer had the power to reveal my soul's longing in a way which felt too unsafe for me to admit.I read nothing more until he published Love in the Time of Cholera which miraculously described further my experience of romantic love. I have not stopped reading Gabriel García Márquez ever since. He understands love better than William Shakespeare.by KalumbaI found One Hundred Years of Solitude in the guest library of a hotel I was working at in Mexico. It was one of the few books in English I had found, so I swooped on it and shoved it up my shirt. It was truly magical and enhanced my experience of Mexico and Latin America and led me to other great Latin American works. This enhanced love of all things Latino meant that my six-month work placement in Mexico turned into 7 amazing years, not quite 100 and certainly not in solitude, as I met my husband here also!(theguardian.com)ANN.Az