After I read 100 Years of Solitude I thought that GGM just wasn't for me. Though I like the playful humor and lighthearted irony attributed to his influence (thinking here of The Head of the Saint by Socorro Acioli), the story itself I found numbingly dull. I am glad I gave him another chance. Chronicle of a Death Foretold is short and the first person perspective of an investigator worked better for me.

The flowing, conversational narration tells such a good story, and pulls a veil over the story's deep violence. Humanity's culpability is on full display, no characters are left sinless. One of the things I liked about this story is the authentic humanity of the characters, like "that is exactly what humans would do!" There are no saints nor heroes, as much as the characters are surrounded by iconography and imagine themselves to be so. That we can laugh at recognizing ourselves is what brings such beauty and grace to GGM's stories.