You Dreamed of Empires

By Alvaro Enrigue  Paperback  A NEW YORK TIMES TOP TEN BOOK OF 2024A NEW YORK PUBLIC LIBRARY TOP TEN BOOK OF THE YEAR"Short, strange, spiky and sublime.” —Dwight Garner, New York Times“Funny, ghastly, eye-opening, marvelous.” —Wall Street JournalFrom the visionary author of Sudden Death, a hallucinatory, revelatory colonial revenge story.One morning in 1519, conquistador Hernán Cortés enters the city of Tenochtitlan – today's Mexico City. Later that day, he will meet the emperor Moctezuma in a collision of two worlds, two empires, two languages, two possible futures.Cortés is accompanied by his captains, his troops, his prized horses, and his two translators: Friar Aguilar, a taciturn friar, and Malinalli, an enslaved, strategic Nahua princess. After nearly bungling their entrance to the city, the Spaniards are greeted at a ceremonial welcome meal by the steely Aztec princess Atotoxtli, sister and wife of Moctezuma. As they await their meeting with the emperor – who is at a