He felt his life was heading towards its climax and it would happen here in Peru, amidst the ghosts and skeletons of the conquistadors who had blatantly raped and pillaged to achieve their selfish ends, but who had built their empires and left their stamp on the world. It was exhilarating too, this feeling of connectedness with history, to realize that he was not alone, despite the delinquent life he had led.I was recently in Peru, so one can imagine how intrigued I was by the idea of this novel, In the Shadow of the Conquistador, and its use of a hike up the Inca Trail to Machu Picchu to lay bare and examine a lifelong friendship between two men. On my trip, my husband and I fell in with an American couple, Randy and Karen, and every time our guide would point out the ruins of an Inca temple that the Spaniards had forced the conquered Peruvians to dismantle (in order to use the blocks for the foundations of their own churches and haciendas), Randy would turn to us and say, “I'm really hating this Pizarro and all his bloodthirsty goons”. Eventually, I pointed out to him that while the Spaniards had indeed committed cultural and racial genocide in Peru (today, there is no one left of pure Inca blood), this is exactly what the Inca themselves did as they built and spread their own empire; humans throughout time and place have always done exactly that; neither they in America nor we in Canada would be living where we are if our early colonisers hadn't cleared our continent of its pesky original inhabitants. With In the Shadow of the Conquistador, author Shane Joseph brings this idea into the modern day: as Me Generation-Baby Boomers who lived their lives without consideration of the consequences for those around them, the main characters act out on the small scale the larger history of Pizarro and the Inca; proving that the blood of the conqueror yet flows through all our veins. Of particular interest to me because of its setting, In the Shadow of the Conquistador was an interesting read, full of adventure and food for further thought.
This book focuses on three main characters: George, the son of a Canadian politician, he was raised to covet power, money, and women (aka the Conquistador); Jeremy/Jimmy, grew up with and was dominated by George (aka the conquered); and Denise, the woman they both loved (aka the gold). As the book begins, Jimmy hears from George for the first time in twenty years; an invitation for the pair to meet in Peru and hike together up to Machu Picchu as research for a book George is writing. As they meet and begin their adventure, the narrative uses several alternating devices to tell the whole story: first person from Jimmy's point-of-view; third person from George's (which implies that the entire story is written later by Jimmy); letters written from Denise to her mother over the years; and excerpts from George's book on Pizarro, the historical passages often mirroring what is happening in the modern day. In this way, we learn of the boys' childhood and early adult years together, what each was up to in their years of estrangement, and if there will be a chance for reconciliation as they approach old age.
My dreams were of George dressed as a Spanish conquistador and me as an Inca chief in Spanish clothes, colonizing parts of South America. We had divided the continent between us, taking countries at random. At last, we faced each other in Machu Picchu – there were no more colonies to take, just each other's. The Puma head on top of Saksyawaman had been replaced by a naked Denise – sexy woman, as she was called. We circled each other for the final duel, him spewing vomit at me, and me shitting in his face. I awoke in a rush, a cry in my throat.I chose the above quote because not only does it nicely capture Jimmy's ambivalent relationship with George, but the details rang true with my own recent experience: every time our guide referred to the site of Saksyawaman, Randy would pipe up with, “Did you say sexy woman? Are we going to see sexy woman?” (Maybe you had to be there, he thought he was hilarious.) And in our group, every day someone new would fall to gut problems – the vomiting and diarrhea was rampant – but happily, Randy's wife Karen is a Gastroenterologist who had brought along powerful antibiotics that cleared everyone up. And it's the details throughout this book that I most appreciated: not just drinking corn beer and coca tea, the popping of Diamox for altitude sickness in Peru, but everywhere from Scarborough and Old Montreal to the Kawarthas and Kananaskis are familiar places to me; each small detail triggered a ping of recognition and the little bits of truth make the whole more believable.
I feel like the ravaged land of the Inca myself, letting two conquerors, first self-indulgent George, then quiet and controlling Jimmy, have their way with me. Five years later, I am still trying to emerge from their shadow, and have now given up trying. I am what I am, or what they have made me.Now to my complaint: The above quote is from one of Denise's letters to her mother, and not only do I think it makes her position in the story too obvious, but I never found anything she wrote in these letters to be believable. As a matter of fact, I didn't find anything about the Denise character believable (set aside the offensiveness of the men playing a single hand of poker to decide which of them would “win” Denise, what educated and independent young woman would accept the outcome, even if she's told it's the result of a “talk” between the men?) I understand that thematically Denise needs to be fairly agentless in order to play the part of the spoils, but her entire story represents no woman I've known (and this is also true for the two women, Ali and Bea, that the men later meet along the Inca Trail).
I thank Shane Joseph for sending me a copy of In the Shadow of the Conquistador; it really was an interesting and well-crafted read. This should be considered a high three stars.
