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3.0 out of 5 stars
Lays the groundwork for later works, May 12 2004
(***1/2) In Evil Hour is one of Gabriel Garcia Marquez's earliest works, through virtues of wit and compassion, the rich and dreamy portrait of a mythical town, in one way or another the book preludes to the most successful One Hundred Years of Solitude. In this short novel, incendiary lampoons infested a Columbian riverside town and traduced its most respected citizens. It began as Cesar Montero marched into the house of Pastor and gunned down its master after reading a crumpled note revealing secret of an affair. What followed was an ineluctable transformation of the town that deceit, murder, inveigle, and violence replaced the inveterate tranquility.The tooth pain-afflicted mayor, the doctor, and Father Angel joined in a cooperative effort to identify and locate the lampoon posters while the town strenuously clung onto the last spindle of sanity. Curfew was enforced and any suspected personnel was jailed for alleged lampoon spreading. A list of all residents who had not had lampoons put up on whom was compiled. Authorities turned to card reading to divine the origin of the traduces. The entire tale is inexorably redolent of a quiet, throbbing paranoia as the result of the lampoons, which haunted and rendered everyone insomniac. The book, though not as flourishing as its successor (One Hundred Years of Solitude), riddles with life trivialities, constant desires for confession and absolution, and ominous signs in the minute episodes that shape daily life. Though somewhat slow-moving and trite at parts, In Evil Hour has the virtues of wit and reveals the foundation upon which the author based in his later novels - vision of some mythical small town being haunted by bits and pieces and waves of political upheaval. Characters are mere instruments and vehicles with which Marquez wrote against government oppression. 2004 (26) © MY
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3.0 out of 5 stars
"God's mercy is another way of beating us up", Sep 21 2002
This short novel is a good but not great. I found it difficult to get into in spite of it's brevity. The book captures the imagination but on a limited scope as the plot is a little convoluted to say the least. I found myself along the way wondering where the story was going as GGM meandered along revealing bits and pieces of his vision of a small town caught up in the grips of the harsh political climate in Colombia. I didn't think any one character was dominant enough nor for that matter were any in particular shown to have much depth. Coming from the Latin American literary giant GGM I was a bit dissappointed. I suppose the characters were not as important as the overall sense of fear cast by an oppresive government which is in search of dissidents while the mice that are menacing the church scurry about at night as the people do likewise under a curfew. The ominous tension created by GGM is the reality that many have to live under in Latini America and the author shows the depth of that fear resides not only in big cities but in small towns as well. Persecution exists in every level of society and GGM shows that even in a sleepy, pictureque little town near the river the serenity of nature can be disrupted by evil. Recommended for those that like GGM and a glimpse at a precursor to "One Hundred Years of Solitude."
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4.0 out of 5 stars
a gripping idea, but not very well written, Sep 10 2001
It took me only a few hours to read this book. I find the idea of this book really interesting- it's not the magical realism that we know from other books by Marquez. However, no other book has drew me into its action in such a way that , while reading, I actually felt I was sharing the fear and the sense of terror that came over the citizens of the town. And that's something!
I didn't like the way it was written, though.The sentences were neither cohesive nor precise. Maybe it's the translation, although I must say I didn't read the English one.
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