Aztec Autumn

After the Aztec empire falls to the Spaniards, a young Aztec named Tenamaxtli begins recruiting from among his fellow survivors of the Conquest to once again challenge the Spaniards and restore the Aztec empire

Uneven, comparatively brief sequel to Jennings's epic historical tale Aztec (1980). Having watched the gruesome auto-da-f‚ of Dark Cloud, the doomed, conflicted hero of Aztec, Tenam xtli, Dark Cloud's son, vows revenge on the Spaniards who have conquered and destroyed the Aztec empire. He befriends a Spanish notary who understands the Aztec language and begins to learn Spanish in a mission in the former imperial capital of Tenochtitlan (the ``The Heart of the One World,'' contemporary Mexico City). Jennings uses Tenam xtli's Candide-like innocence to poke fun at the bearded, brutal Europeans with their booming arquebuses, their appetite for cruelty and gold, and their odd religion, which compels them to ``eat their god'' during communion. Daunted by the contradictions of Christianity, Tenam xtli puzzles out the recipe for gunpowder, procures a copy of a Spanish arquebus, and makes a decisive terrorist strike against a Spanish garrison before returning to his native Aztlan. Along the way, he finds a utopian settlement ruled by a kindly Spanish priest, tarries lustfully in a village of women whose men have been slaughtered, befriends a fierce, bald-headed female warrior named Tiptoe, tangles with a seemingly immortal sorceress named G'nda Ke', and mounts the throne of his ancestral homestead as the ultimate ruler. Jennings's relentlessly talky narrative doesn't achieve the momentum of his earlier masterpiece, and, despite numerous references to divine coincidences, his twisted plot depends on too many trite devices. Characters thought to be lost, dead, incompetent, or merely far away are forever popping up to either save the day or ruin it for Tenam xtli, whose rigid concept of honor compels him to lead a rebellion that even he realizes he can't win. A bumpy, meandering, wryly tragic tale, graced with delightful moments of passion and insight into the ancient culture that still haunts (and influences) modern Mexico. (First printing of 250,000) -- Copyright ©1997, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

The sequel to the author's internationally best-selling Aztec (1982) returns to the Mexico of the conquistadors. The previous novel enveloped the reader in the traditions and customs of Aztec society before and during the bloody Spanish conquest. The story as it now unfolds finds us in postconquest Mexico, events now narrated by a young Aztec man whose uncle is an esteemed nobleman. The Spanish conquerors have settled in to run a tightly controlled enterprise, and the novel springs into action when the young hero decides no other course is available to him than to seek revenge for the foul murder of his father by the conquerors. What the reader is witness to in these compelling pages, then, is the avenger's careful gathering together of an insurrectionary movement. Jennings' ability to marshal the results of considerable research into a smoothly flowing, never sluggish narrative is remarkable; here he gives appreciators of historical fiction something to relish. Brad Hooper