The Last Days of the Incas

This is an excellent book. A fast and detailed narrative, an exhilarating read till the last page. I have to agree with one reviewer, I was also willing the Inca rebellion on to victory while knowing the grim fate that awaited them. The description of the battle scenes is like something out of Braveheart. The Conquistadors treatment of the native people was nothing short of appalling. They desecrated their sacred relics, stole their ornate gold and silver artifacts only to melt then down into blocks, they claimed their land and even their women and then to top it all off killed them in the name of their Christian God. Things were so different in the fifteenth century, Pizzarro needed a mandate from the queen of Spain to conquer Peru, once secured this was a license to rob, plunder and pillage. It's strange how men seemingly without scruples wouldn't advance an inch in a foreign country thousands of miles from Spain without the royal approval. The European invaders in my opinion were in a close second behind the Nazis as far as human brutality is concerned. The author delivers the story with passion and zeal that leaves you hoping throughout the story that the Incas will unite under one ruler, regroup and prevail. The author does an excellent job explaining how the Incas were defeated despite their overwhelming numbers (Incas in their millions against 169 Spaniards). Mr. MacQuarrie takes the reader back to a time when peoples of the world were cut off from each other for thousands of years each developing independently of one another then suddenly thrust into battle in 1531. It would be like bringing rifles, tanks, machine guns and bombs to bear upon cavalry units. The Incas had never seen a horse let alone a man commanding such a large animal. The Spanish horses could also fight in battle by charging, biting and head butting. It's very difficult to dispatch an armored man wielding a sword on horseback with a wooden club. The Incas had no iron tools or weapons. The Incas had no armor for protection. They thought the Spaniards were gods who could unleash a terrible calamity upon them at any time. Their moral was at an all time low. The Incas had no monetary system but they did pay tax to the emperor in the form of their labor, (surprisingly around 30% about what is deducted from today's salaries) making weapons, growing food and maintaining storage facilities. The Incas were a well organized and a very sophisticated civilization but no match for superior technology and foreign diseases the Europeans brought with them. The great thing about this book is that it's so easy to read and get absorbed in the story. It's like a good work of fiction only that its not fiction. You will learn so much from this book. The author covers all aspects of Inca and Spanish culture and how they played out in Peru some 477 years ago. But there is so much more in this book a sufficient review would have to be several pages to do it justice...hope this helped.

My subject title says it all. This book explores the full range of human emotions in an account so spectacular and gut wrenching that it defies belief.

The story is dutifully told and well narrated by Mr. MacQuarrie without being overly dramatic. He has researched the facts with the most accurate material and evidence available to recreate what exactly happened over the course of the 90 year decline of the Inca Empire at the hands of what could be most accurately described as blood thirsty, illiterate, murdering hooligans. The facts themselves are the most amazing aspects of the book and Mr. MacQuarrie serves as our guide through the events that explore a cardinally sinful range of human emotions; Lust, Gluttony, Greed, Sloth, Wrath, Envy and Pride. Throw in complete improbability, which Jared Diamond could only explain, with a smattering of betrayal and you have the gist.

I enjoyed this book thoroughly and recommend it whole heartedly.

This is, with no exaggeration, the most unbelievable story I have ever read. Seriously, a hundred and something Spaniards enslave an entire country only to become some of the richest people on the planet. The tragedy and scale of this is really unmatched. Not to take anything away from the author, but it would be hard to screw this up. And he doesn't. It is meticulously researched, and engrossing. I had small issue with the dramatic voice he used to try and bring the events to life, but this was minor.

This is an apparently well researched history that is enjoyable to read. The concern I have is relative to the author's habit of citing conflicting and/or inconsistent ages of the characters. For example, on pages 172 and 174, Gonzalo Pizarro is the "twenty-three-year old", yet on page 175 he is twenty-one. Another: on page 217, Juan Pizarro is the"twenty-five-year-old Juan" while in the very next paragraph Juan is "the twenty-three-year-old."

No doubt the author is dealing with various source data, but if he felt it so important to state the ages of his characters in multiple places, why didn't he get it right? Sadly, this sloppiness throws some doubt on the scholarship behind the entire book. I am not an expert on the Inca's and merely read this book for enjoyment and personal education. If a mere layman can find such obvious conflicts and errors, one wonders what else might be wrong relative to more important items presents as facts in this book.

This book had me immersed in it for 5 days. Luckily I was off work. In the first part, it recounts in great details the conquest of Peru by the conquistadores, making us outraged at the treatment the Incas received over the almost 40 years the fight for their rich land continued. What we seldom hear is that the Incas and their allies raged a counter-attack against the Spaniards before they disappeared as a ruling civilization in Peru. The book recounts this rebellion. The second part deals with the rediscovery by explorers of such ancient ruins of the Incas as Macchu Picchu and Vilcabamba.

The whole story is absolutely halting and cinematic in quality. I ate up the whole 500 and something pages as if it were not enough. I feel I have learned tremendously about the Incas and what happened to them and I now dream of traveling to that part of the world. All in all, a tragic story told in an extraordinary way by the author.