I’m not sure why I decided to read Love in the Time of Cholera or who recommended it and when but I know it’s been on my library reading list for a while, so when it became available, I downloaded it, started it and then about 10% into it, I put it aside.
It wasn’t that it was bad. It wasn’t that I didn’t like it. It was just that I felt that this was not a book I could read in two, five or even ten minute increments. This book required a commitment.
It didn’t help that the version in my Kindle didn’t give any chapter indications or any feedback whatsoever as to my progress. And though this book came in at only 387 pages it felt much longer. So I picked it up again, but only at those times when I knew I had at least an uninterrupted hour I could devote to reading.
The storytelling is mostly exposition with flashbacks within flashbacks and sometimes spends much time focusing on characters that are not really relevant to the story. Not to mention, though written in third person omniscient narrative, the focus of attention often switches without any break in page, paragraph or even sentence.
All that said, at about 75% in (and I’m not really sure why I gave it so much time), I decided I did like the story, though I couldn’t identify with or even like either main character. So perhaps that says something about the author’s ability to spin a yarn that spans lifetimes, that I plodded through to what ended up being a satisfying ending.
Not for everyone, and not an easy read but I’m glad I read it.