Gary Jennings’ novel Aztec Autumn is a fine example of how to make history more interesting through storytelling, but the history frequently overshadows the story and makes the novel a bit…what’s the word?…awkward.
The book follows the life of Tenamaxtli, an Aztec nobleman living during the early years of the Spanish colonization of the New World who leads a rebellion against the conquistadors several years after Cortez captured Tenochtitlan (Mexico City). To make things even more interesting, the hero was a real person and his rebellion really did take place during the Mixton War.
To showcase an impressive amount of historical research, Jennings has his hero wandering the countryside in preparation for his rebellion, giving him ample opportunity to discover and explore various settings, cultures, and historical figures of the day. To the history-minded reader, this is fascinating material and it is usually rather easy to tell when something historical (rather than narrative) is being explored.
Which brings us to the problem.
Jennings sends his hero on a long, meandering quest around western and northern Mexico (”the One World”) in search of allies, but this is really a sort of picaresque in which Tenamaxtli serves as an unwitting tour guide to show us:
- the rebuilding of Mexico City
- the cruelty of the Church
- the kindness of the Church
- the land of bald women
- the land of primitive savages
- the island of pearl-diving women
- Spanish explorers
- the treatment of Africans
- cross-cultural politics
- religion
All of which is fine and interesting, and while it is far more engaging than any history textbook, it makes for a clunky work of fiction. Tenamaxtli’s grand rebellion against the Spanish Empire becomes more of an excuse to travel (and sleep with a lot of women) than a story of war or survival.
The last issue I have with the book is the hero himself. While I believe that Jennings has created the most authentic Aztecatl character Americanly possible, it is hard to like him. Again, Tenamaxtli himself is a historical and cultural exploration of attitudes toward men and women, children and the elderly, sex, food, marriage, religion, racism, etc. The end result is someone a bit mechanical, as well as someone a bit hard to empathize with.
So while Aztec Autumn succeeds mightily in delivering history in a highly engaging manner, it never quite reaches the moment in which you forget you’re reading a book and just fall into the story.
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