A relatively boring adaptation of a relatively interesting story. Not Márquez's best by far! ( )

This was the first non-fiction book written by Marquez,a tale of Columbia in the 1990s when the country was at war within itself, with the drug traffickers, especially Pablo Escobar, head of the Medellin cartel. The war was brutal on both sides. The biggest threat to the cartels was extradition to the USA and the prospect of life in a US prison. Escobar kidnapped ten men and women at different times and with different connections to use a bargaining chips in his demand for immunity from extradition, and to secure the protection he sought as the price for surrendering to the government and ending the war. The book reads like something written by a superior investigative reporter (Marquez was a reporter in his earlier life), but Marquez also brings a writer’s sensibility to the story with his focus on the narrative of events, the hopes and fears of those held captive and those working for their release, the false starts and successes, the tensions within the government and between the government and those working from the outside (the greatest fear of those working for the release of loved ones was that the security forces would find the kidnappers and attempt a rescue which everyone knew would result in the immediate death of the prisoners), the interplay of characters and personalities, the balance between events dictated and controlled and those that seem to unfold with an uncontrollable inevitability of their own, the gross fear of those who know they can be killed at a moment’s notice and who believe at various times that it is imminent and how different people deal with such monstrous stress. A strength of the book is the even handed perspective from all sides: the victims, the kidnappers, the very young teenaged guards, the President of the country, the husbands, fathers, brothers, sisters, mothers left to hope and pray and work for the release of their family members. A very interesting read.

I had a very difficult time getting into this book and nearly gave it up half way through. I was not really intrigued until about page 130 or so of the 290 page book. My problem was twofold: first of all, the journalistic style made this story very dispassionate, which was difficult for a story of kidnappings. I never felt that I knew any of the people involved in the story, and I didn’t particularly care about or for them, not because they were bad people or unsympathetic, just because there was little to no emotion expressed in the writing. Secondly, this book was decidedly written for a South American, if not solely Colombian, audience. I say this because names of prominent Colombians and Colombian politicians are thrown about with the expectation that you will know exactly who they are. This isn’t necessarily a failing on the part of the author, it tells me that the book was written more to explain and heal? remember? the kidnappings within the country than to tell the story of the kidnappings to a wider audience. This book is for people who followed the kidnappings as they happened and want to know the details.

For the rest of the review:
http://devourerofbooks.wordpress.com/... ( )

Not gripping like his other books, this is still beautiful to read, just a bit slow. ( )

A journalist account of wealthy Columbians who were kidnapped by rebels from the perspective of both the kidnapped and the kidnappers. A good read - and Marquez does an admirable job of telling both sides of the story. ( )