Joey Anderson’s Reviews > Terra Nostra > Status Update

Only fifty pages to go in this monstrously long novel. I have just finished Phillip II's monologue as he lay dying.

The second part, “The New World,” follows Cortez, in his own voice, as he conquers Mexico and discovers his actual identity as the Plumed Serpent/Quetzalcoatl. Although told in a religious/mythological style, the narrative is quite good if you can tolerate/decipher the language.

You will need your history of Europe for this one: so far, Fuentes has whisked me through three different centuries (the twentieth, the sixteenth, the twelth (I think)), but one figure with the red cross on his back permeates all sections, but I couldn't say why. I'm uncertain what is dream, memory, or actual event. Or what is miracle or mystery.