There are No Thieves in this Town by Gabriel Garcia Marquez

The wannabe hustler.

Have I been bamboozled? Hoodwinked? Is this some kind of literary prank? Surely, this can't be the same Gabriel García Márquez who gave us such masterful short stories as "A Very Old Man With Enormous Wings" or "One of These Days." But alas, nobody’s perfect—not even a literary giant. Apparently, even the great Márquez can have an off day. Maybe my expectations were set too high, but There Are No Thieves in This Town left me thoroughly disappointed, with barely a redeeming quality in sight.

Dámaso, a chain-smoking young man barely scraping by, ignores the protests of his pregnant wife and decides to rob the local pool hall. He’s hoping to score some cash but, finding none, settles for stealing…the pool balls. Yes, really. Not exactly Ocean’s Eleven. His grand plan? Sell them for a profit in a town so poor it’s a miracle they even have a pool hall. To make matters worse, Dámaso isn't just unlucky—he's reckless, blowing money on alcohol and prostitutes while his wife waits for him at home, worried sick. He's a terrible husband and I'm not sure why she doesn't leave him. 

Márquez ditches his signature magical realism in favor of a bleak dose of social realism, but here it lacks emotional weight. The characters feel hollow, the story plods along at a snail’s pace, and just when you think it might be leading somewhere… it fizzles out with an anti-climactic ending. And if that weren’t enough, the story is laced with blatant anti-Black racism, misogyny, and unnecessary violence against women—making it not just dull, but actively unpleasant to read.

Maybe Márquez was experimenting, or maybe he was just having a bad writing day—it doesn't really matter. Either way, I still think he's a talented author but it might be a while before I revisit his work.