What was most important was the expression she had on her face. She did not change her expression at all when telling her stories, and everyone was surprised. In previous attempts to write One Hundred Years of Solitude, I tried to tell the story without believing in it. I discovered that what I had to do was believe in them myself and write them with the same expression with which my grandmother told them: with a brick face.” Write a short story that incorporates mystical or supernatural elements while maintaining a tone based in reality, in which these elements are considered commonplace. She told things that sounded supernatural and fantastic, but she told them with complete naturalness. When I finally discovered the tone I had to use, I sat down for eighteen months and worked every day. “The tone that I eventually used in One Hundred Years of Solitude was based on the way my grandmother used to tell stories. She told things that sounded supernatural and fantastic but she told them with complete naturalness…. What was most important was the expression she had on her face. I discovered that what I had to do was believe in them myself and write them with the same expression with which my grandmother told them: with a brick face” – Gabriel García Márquez, The Paris Review. One Hundred Years of Solitude’s author took cues from Kafka – and his grandmother – to tell an impossible story that disarms the reader’s scepticism.