Catalina de Cerrato is raised by her widowed father Don Alonso in 1551 in Guatemala, only 30 years after the Spanish Invasion. Don Alonso is a Spaniard and Catalina’s mother was a Maya noblewoman. Catalina vowed to her mother that she would preserve the lost sacred text of the Popol Vuh, the treasured and now forbidden history of the K’iche’ people. On the other hand, she wants to obey her father, who is a ruling member of the Spanish hierarchy.
Catalina meets two men who are fighting for the indigenous population, who are of the K’iche’ people; Lord Juan and Cristóbal. When her father finds out he takes her to Santiago with him and eventually marries her off to a man of his choosing. Catalina is given the choice to either marry Nico, or to go to Spain. She chose the marriage. Soon after her marriage Catalina falls ill and it takes a long time for her to recover.
I liked the divide in Catalina’s upbringing: her father taught her the Greek myths and the gods in his stories were Hephaestus and Hera, but her mother’s tales were of the gods Auilix and Xbalanque. Her mother told her not to tell the stories of the K’iche’ to her father and Catalina doesn’t quite understand why in the beginning of the book, at the end of the book, several years later, I think she does.
Read for The 52 Book Club Reading Challenge 2025
Prompt 15: Includes Latin American History
Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
