I didn't really finish this. I got up to page 180 and then skimmed the rest, and I feel very happy about my decision not to finish. 
 My initial problem with the book was the crazy time-jumping for the first 60ish pages. Sometimes I appreciate a book where the writing is like a spoken conversation, with detours and roundabouts and leaps in storytelling, and sometimes I don't. This time, I didn't. But the writing was beautiful, so I hung in there. 
 Somewhere in the 60's, the storyline seemed to settle somewhat. Okay, the point of the story isn't (view spoiler)[the dead photographer, it's not his mysterious background or his common-law wife in the poor district, it's not even Dr. Urbino (who was my favorite character!), (hide spoiler)], it's the "love story" of Florentino Ariza and Fermina Daza. (And yes, I'm aware that the back of the book probably said this, but my library copy has the library ID and barcode plastered right across the description, so I went into this with no idea of what to expect!) 
 I say "love story" because, (view spoiler)[UGH. Sorry, creepy lifelong obsession =/= love. It just doesn't. When I realized that this emotionally stunted, selfish, manipulative man-child was the "hero" of this story, I couldn't believe it. This is what people say is one of the greatest love stories ever written? Florentino's obsessive creeping on a woman who rejected him fifty-plus years ago? If you want to sum up Florentino's character in one sentence, I'd say "he's a guy who slept with literally hundreds of women in his life, but has the audacity to tell his one true love that he's a virgin because he never really loved any of the others." 
 And just think, I already disliked the character ... the seducing/grooming/manipulating of an actual adolescent girl into becoming his sexual partner was just the exclamation point on my disgust. (hide spoiler)] 
 Gabriel Garcia Marquez is a legendary author, and I'm fully prepared to believe that this misfire of a book is due to my own likes and dislikes. So I do intend to read at least one more of his works - probably 100 Years of Solitude. But if there's a book that is going to open my eyes to the magic of his works, this one wasn't it.