Review by Choice Review
One of the best-known sagas in the history of the Spanish empire in the Americas is that of Alvar Nunez Cabeza de Vaca. He and two other Spaniards and a Moroccan slave were the only survivors of the disastrous expedition to Florida led by Panfilo de Narvaez in 1528. Rather than find gold and souls to convert to Christianity, Narvaez and most of his followers met their deaths. The four remaining would-be conquistadors trekked across the Gulf Coast into Texas, finally ending their ordeal by reaching Spanish settlements in western Mexico in 1536. They had stayed alive by successfully operating as healers of Indians among the many tribes they encountered in their arduous journey. Unlike most other treatments of this episode, Schneider's devotes almost two-thirds of the narrative to the Narvaez expedition. He based the work largely on Cabeza de Vaca's famous account and the joint report of the survivors, supplemented by information inferred from other Spanish sources and anthropological evidence. Throughout this story of murder, enslavement, looting, torture, and starvation, the author maintains a breezy tone and consistently engages the reader. ^BSumming Up: Highly recommended. All levels/libraries. M. J. Brodhead U.S. Army Corps of Engineers
Copyright American Library Association, used with permission.
Review by Booklist Review
Schneider presents would-be conquistador Cabeza de Vaca's incredible survival story. The treasurer of an attempted conquest of Florida in 1528, de Vaca was one of four remnants of the disastrous Narvaez expedition and wrote a memoir about his ordeal. Working off that central document, Schneider seamlessly fixes it to contextual sources (archaeology; records of the ensuing de Soto and Coronado expeditions) to render a perceptive sense of the country the fugitive Spaniards traveled through and the Indians they encountered. Under the theme of inverted expectations, Schneider relates the Spaniards' incremental descent from violently self-assured superiority over Indians, to dependence, and, finally, enslavement for the last of the living. That one of them, Esteban, already a slave, helped lead the band to Mexico, and received re-enslavement for his pains, enhances Schneider's excellent development of cultural self-perceptions. Equally able in his dramatizations of the privations and brutalities suffusing this extraordinary tale, Schneider scores big with fans of historical (mis)adventure. --Gilbert Taylor Copyright 2006 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Despite his failure to suppress the rebellious Cortes in Mexico, would-be conquistador Panfilo de Narvaez was given another chance by the king of Spain, who awarded him governorship over the entire Gulf Coast of the modern United States. But Narvaez's luck was no better this time: the expedition, which arrived in 1528, was a complete disaster. Out of the 400 men who went ashore in Florida, only four made it to Mexico eight years later, long after Narvaez himself was lost at sea in a makeshift boat. Schneider (The Adirondacks) has only two firsthand documents to work with, but he ably combines the raw narrative with a wealth of secondary research to create a vivid tale filled with gripping scenes, as when natives lead the starving Spanish forces into a swamp ambush. Though primarily concerned with the Spaniards' experiences, Schneider also provides well-rounded portrayals of the indigenous cultures they came in contact with-among them tribes that came to regard the handful of survivors as magical healers who could raise the dead. The ethnographic balance takes a thrilling adventure and turns it into an engrossing case study of early European colonialism gone epically wrong. Illus., map. (May 5) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Library Journal Review
In 1527, a Spanish expedition led by Panfilo de Narvaez was sent by King Charles V of Spain to embark from Florida and "conquer and subdivide" the North American Gulf Coast. After landing in the Tampa Bay area in 1528, Narvaez decided to split his force of nearly 600 men, with over 400 soldiers to march inland and the rest remaining with the ships. This decision doomed the expedition: clashes with Native Americans, disease, hurricanes, shipwrecks, cannibalism, starvation, and exposure reduced the conquering force to four who emerged in western Mexico eight years later. What happened in between has been a controversial subject for centuries. Schneider (The Adirondacks) does an excellent job weaving together the two surviving firsthand accounts-one by surviving explorer Cabeza de Vaca and the other by all four survivors-with archaeological, anthropological, and historical research into pre-Colonial indigenous populations and the Spanish expeditions of that era to produce a fine book. Recommended for all public libraries.-Margaret Atwater-Singer, Univ. of Evansville Libs., IN (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
Talk about a bad trip: Four would-be conquerors wander across some of North America's most difficult country for eight years, and they don't even find gold to make up for their troubles. The story of Álvar Nú¿ez Cabeza de Vaca's unwanted expedition into the interior is well-known to students of Spanish colonial history and has a huge scholarly literature surrounding it, but there are few popular works devoted to it as compared to, say, the easier journey of Lewis and Clark. Schneider's well-told tale begins with avarice and jealousy, as the conquistador Pánfilo de Narváez, having rebelled against the better-connected Hernán Corts and been imprisoned for his troubles, nonetheless manages to convince the Spanish crown to let him take charge of conquering "the entire Gulf Coast of what would one day become the United States." His fleet--not well-outfitted, for Narváez was broke--made the area of Tampa Bay in 1528, and his contingent of Caribs, Africans and Spanish soldiers marched off into the unknown for food and riches. Second-in-command by virtue of being King Charles V's "eyes and ears on the ground during the expedition"--for, naturally, the king wanted his cut--Cabeza de Vaca found himself contesting Narváez's increasingly impetuous decisions at every turn. Disappointed and embattled, the company reached what is now Galveston Bay before being shipwrecked; Narváez died, and the remaining force lost man after man until just three were left besides Cabeza de Vaca. This multicultural crew, one of whom, Schneider guesses, was a converted Jew, the other an African slave, then wandered for thousands of miles until eventually finding a Spanish settlement in western Mexico. Through all of this, Schneider does a solid job of enhancing an intrinsically interesting story without getting in the way. A you-are-there enterprise in the Steven Ambrose vein, full of surprising turns and not a few ironies. Copyright ©Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
