Gabriel Garcia Marquez's fanciful and lush novel is a romantic epic about love in its many guises, the clash of romanticism and rationalism, and the terrible agony of love sickness. At the apex of the novel's love triangle is Fermina Daza, who rejects her young lover Florentino Ariza, and marries the practical doctor Juvenal Urbino. While she lives a respectable and moral married life, Arize's passion for her is undiminished--despite his conquest of 622 other women. After 53 years, Urbino dies, and their love and life together begins again. The novel was adapted into a film in 2007 starring Javier Bardem as the love-smitten Ariza.