Considered one of the most significant authors of the 20th century and one of the best in the Spanish language, Gabriel García Márquez was awarded the 1972 Neustadt International Prize for Literature and the 1982 Nobel Prize in Literature. This bundle includes the following novels: News of a Kidnapping; Love in the Time of Cholera; Of Love and Other Demons; and The Autumn of the Patriarch.
Of Love and Other Demons
When a witch doctor appears on the Marquis de Casalduero's doorstep prophesising a plague of rabies in the Colombian seaport, he dismisses her claims - until he hears that his young daughter, Sierva María, was one of four people bitten by a rabid dog, and the only one to survive. Sierva María appears completely unscathed - but as rumours of the plague spread, the Marquis and his wife wonder at her continuing good health. In a town consumed by superstition, it's not long before them, and everyone else, put her survival down to a demonic possession and begin to see her supernatural powers as the cause of the town's woes. Only the young priest charged with exorcizing the evil spirit recognises the girl's sanity, but can he convince the town that it's not her that needs healing?
The Autumn of the Patriarch
As the citizens of an unnamed Caribbean nation creep through dusty corridors in search of their tyrannical leader, they cannot comprehend that the frail and withered man lying dead on the floor can be the self-styled General of the Universe. Their arrogant, manically violent leader, known for serving up traitors to dinner guests and drowning young children at sea, can surely not die the humiliating death of a mere mortal? Tracing the demands of a man whose egocentric excesses mask the loneliness of isolation and whose lies have become so ingrained that they are indistinguishable from truth, Márquez has created a fantastical portrait of despotism that rings with an air of reality.
Love in the Time of Cholera
Fifty-one years, nine months and four days have passed since Fermina Daza rebuffed hopeless romantic Florentino Ariza's impassioned advances and married Dr Juvenal Urbino instead. During that half-century, Florentino has fallen into the arms of many delighted women but has loved none but Fermina. Having sworn his eternal love to her, he lives for the day when he can court her again. When Fermina's husband is killed trying to retrieve his pet parrot from a mango tree, Florentino seizes his chance to declare his enduring love. But can young love find new life in the twilight of their lives?
News of a Kidnapping
Pablo Escobar: billionaire drugs baron, ruthless manipulator brutal killer and jefe of the infamous Medellin cartel. A man whose importance in the international drug trade and renowned for his charitable work among the poor brought him influence and power in his home country of Colombia, and the unwanted attention of the American courts. Terrified of the new Colombian President's determination to extradite him to America, Escobar found the best bargaining tools he could find: hostages. In the winter of 1990, ten relatives of Colombian politicians, mostly women, were abducted and held hostage as Escobar attempted to strong-arm the government into blocking his extradition. Two died, the rest survived, and from their harrowing stories Marquez retells, with vivid clarity, the terror and uncertainty of those dark and volatile months.
Unless you're Jack Bauer, of course. Which you aren't. He's fictional - and unless artificial intelligence has come a long way in a short space of time, you're very much real.
If you consider yourself a professional procrastinator, 24 hours is barely enough time to read your emails, let alone respond. Especially if you sleep the recommended ten hours a night.
But it's all we give you to capitalise on our great deals.
And you've just wasted five minutes reading this and wondering how to make the simple act of email reading last a full work day.