Until August by Gabriel Garcia Márquez

Posted by Ms A on April 25, 2024 in All | Leave a comment

Gabriel Garcia Márquez, the Colombian, Nobel Prize winning author of Love in the Time of Cholera and One Hundred Years of Solitude, died in Mexico City in 2014. He had started work on Until August many years before but, with the onset of dementia, decided it wasn’t worthy of publishing and asked that it be destroyed.  Controversially, his two sons disagreed and the book was published posthumously this year. 

As much as Márquez Senior might disagree, I am personally grateful for the afternoon delight the family’s decision delivered.

Until August gives us the story of Ana Magdalena Bach, an elegant, happily married woman with a handsome husband, cultured life and two adult children.  On 16 August every year, she travels to a small, touristy island where her mother is buried. She dines locally, buys her mother’s favourite flowers, spends time at her grave and then…completely out of character, seeks out a new lover. Each year’s surprising, lustful adventure stirs new emotions and new mediations on life, love and marriage.

With just a handful of colourful characters and a simple plot, it wasn’t until the very end that I recognised Gabriel Garcia Marquez’ unique, South American style. And then I smiled.

Until August has received mixed reviews but, to me, it was a thoroughly enjoyable, easy, breezy read.  If nothing else, the petite hardcover, and last book we’ll ever receive from one of world’s most wonderful writers, is a perfect gift for any book lover or collector.  

And that’s my 2 cents worth.