One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel García Márquez

Readers remember this book for its fanciful impossibilities. Yet Marquez starts with the exact opposite—tapping the unexpected power to delight of the commonplace. When the sagacious gypsy Melquíades (based on Borges, some have suggested) arrives in Macondo, he mesmerizes José Arcadio Buendía with everyday items: magnets, false teeth, a telescope. The r…