Rating: 
Summary: Aztec Lite
Review: If you've already read "Aztec", there is no need to read this book. If you haven't read "Aztec", and are intimidated by its length, then "Aztec Autumn" may be the book for you.
"Aztec Autumn" covers much the same ground as "Aztec": the natives' puzzled reaction to Christianity, the Spanish conquerors failing to live it up their stated ideals, obligatory sex scenes which show how the natives innocently enjoy pretty much anything consensual. Though a sequel to "Aztec", "Aztec Autumn" adds little to the original story.
Gary Jennings seems tired in this novel. There are occasional flashes of his story-telling skills which enliven the story, but by and large, Mr. Jennings seems to be going through the motions.
Rating: 
Summary: Short and poorly done
Review: I was disappointed when I first picked this book up to find that it is about half the length of Jennings' previous books. After reading it, I count myself lucky that it wasn't longer.
Compared with his earlier books, this book is poorly plotted and unsatisfying. Depending on your point of view, the relative absence of the strong sexual content in his earlier books may or may not be a good point.
As usual, Jennings' frequent gratuitous use of unfamilar words gets in the way of the story. Although he obviously cannot name an Aztec character George or Alice, he needn't use Aztec words (many apparently invented) for common household items.
This book was painful to read
Rating: 
Summary: Aztec Autumn
Review: Book was a fairly good read, however, Jennings seems to be trying to recapture the success of his earlier book, "Aztec", rather than create a new and original story. At times it seems as though both characters are the same person, rather than father and son. The new character, Tenamixtli, seems to be just an updated version of his father, Mixtli, from the original Aztec. Jenning should have made more effort to give Tenamixtli his own unique personality. All in all, the book was entertaining, but lacked the character developement that made "Aztec" the page turner that it was.
Rating:
Summary: Why Sequels Never Surpass the Original
Review: Gary Jennings' AZTEC was a stunning epic of blood and gore - a fascinating study of the fall of the Aztec empire told in first person from an "eye witness". Unfortunately, this much awaited sequel, AZTEC AUTUMN, is not as well thought-out as the first book. The story is formulaic in the now familiar Gary Jennings style (see JOURNEYER and RAPTOR) - the hero loses his virginity at an early age; experiments with incest; brags about being uncircumcised; and has sex with first - the great love of his life (who always dies) and secondly - with the second great love (who always dies). I'm sorry but I loved Jennings' JOURNEYER and AZTEC, but it's hard to forgive the blatancy of his formula in AZTEC AUTUMN - the roots are showing! Clearly AZTEC AUTUMN is just a retread of the far better earlier book - but is sorely lacking in a re-write or two to make the reader overlook how systematic is his formula.
Rating:
Summary: Good story, but not as great as the first one...
Review: - - - * * * MIGHT CONTAIN SPOILERS * * * - - -
Now let me tell you, I think this was a great book, and a good plot for a sequel, the already fallen Aztecs rising to drive away the Spanish... excellent.
The way the story was written I found to be nice, as some sort of diary just like the prequel. But I really didn't liked the ending...
The problem is that the story was told in some sort of way that you can see every step of the army being built and making open war to the Spanish, but some place on the last 6 pages everything went through the toilet... I mean, the climax, the thousands of Aztecs going to attack Aguascalientes, and in 10 lines or so the hole of the Aztec army is defeated and the Spanish win... I found that to be a pretty hasty ending, not as in the first one... and you start wondering "Did Gary Jennings was really so eager to get rid of writing this story that he just finished it as fast as he could?"... "The Aztecs marched to the city but it was a trap, we fought, but lost, and the only survivors were me and some Yaki doctor... THE END"
The fantastical trait was also a downer... what made the first one so great was the fact that you could believe it happened, but in this one you meet G'nda Ké, a Yaki woman that when she happens to die, she appears to have been alive for thousands of years... also, a woman called Pakapeti, who is pregnant, but although you are never told what it is, you can infer that it is some sort of monster... that just took away all the illusion of reality to this story...
Also, you see Tenamaxtli living many episodes lived by Mixtli, his early virginity loss, the incest, getting lost in the sea...
It was a good story, the last 20 pages are the downside, but it still was a pretty enjoyable book...
Rating: 
Summary: I read it first....
Review: Most people have been saying that Aztec Autumn isn't nearly as good as its predecessors; even the reviewers that sort of like it only reccomend reading it after reading the first book, Aztec.
Well, I came across Aztec Autumn before I had even known that it was a sequel. In other words, I (unknowingly) did exactly the opposite of what the previous reviewers said, and it certainly worked out - I loved it.
It's full of sex, gore, violence, and so on - everything that people loved in Aztec is just as present in Autumn (some, of course, would say it is just a retread - I hadn't tread the first time). Reading Aztec illuminates a bit of the beginning of Autumn, but Autumn certainly, for me, stands alone. Reading Aztec later made *it* seem a bit of a retread, not this book.
But there are other ways in which the sequel is better than the predecessor, even if you read it second. The Aztecs battling back is much more satisfying than their one small, short-lived victory in Aztec. Not only that, the ending is much better, much more *mature*. To wit:
*************
I resented and resisted the aliens among us. But, over time, I have met and admired many of th ese aliens--the white Alonso, the black Esteban, the padre Quiraga, your mulata mother, Rebeca, and finally you, dear daughter, who commingle so many different bloods. I realize now--and I accept--I am even proud--the YOUR lovely face, Veronica, is the new Face of The One World. To you, and to your sons and daughters and to The One World, I wish you all good things.
*************
It's not really uplifting, but not exactly depressing - certainly it's *interesting*. There is a new face emerging, that of Latin America. It's not European, it's not Native American. That is the true legacy of Cortes's battles and Motecuzoma's failures, and that makes Aztec Autumn a much more lasting book than its predecessor.
Especially if read first. :-)
Rating: 
Summary: I'm starting to hate the Spanish....
Review: Well, the Spanish Conquerers of Old anyway.
Another great book by Gary Jennings, and though it did not grip me as much as Aztec did, I did really enjoy it.
In the second installment of the Aztec series, Jennings follows Mixtli's son thru the now almost conquered Aztec empire, and although we all know the outcome of that I still deep down kept wishing that Tenamixtli somehow would magically change history and kick those spanish conquerers out of what is now Mexico.
In typical Jennings style the book is at times extremely violent and sexually graphic, but is very well written and researched. If you loved Aztec, you'll enjoy this one as well.
Rating:
Summary: It's not AZTEC, but then, what could ever be...
Review: AZTEC is the best historical novel I've ever read. Thus, AZTEC AUTUMN can't possibly match it. But it comes pretty close. The shortcomings: it doesn't cover the same sweeping segment of history that the first one does...it's wedging a story into the middle of the story we were told in the first book. It treads some of the same ground, particularly when it comes to lurid sex. The first book was packed with sex too, but, dare I say it, those scenes had a bit more context. THe ending is not entirely satisfying, but part of that is because history didn't exactly turn out all that satisfying either, if you're a fan of the Aztecs! The pluses: The action and battle scenes are bigger and better. We get to see the Aztecs get some revenge, finally. (The book mostly follows an effort to drive out the Spaniards.) And it's always great to visit with familiar and much-loved characters. I highly recommend the book, but ONLY, ONLY, ONLY if you've read the first one.
Rating:
Summary: A Great Sequel
Review: I must confess I am mystified by the negative reviews of this book. Yes, there's sex, violence, sex, gore, sex, historical research galore, and . . . oh, yes, some sex, too. But the book has so much more than that. First of all, it's based, very loosely, on historical fact. There really was a rebellion against the conquering Spaniards, led by a native from Aztlan named John the English, and yes, it very nearly did succeed. The rest is fiction of course, and full of the kinds of in-your-face native culture descriptions that were so delightful in 'Aztec,' complete, as before, with incest, human sacrifice, fantastical myth, bloody warfare, and lots of graphic sex of all sorts. But isn't that why you read it?!? 'Aztec' was great, but it did have it's weaker moments. First, the constant interruptions to show the Spaniards' reactions to the narrative got a bit old after while. Second, the supposedly mature narrator seemed very immature in his delight in scandalizing his listeners. Third, the story sprawled all over the place, covering as many different types of settings and cultures as possible-- there wasn't any central core thread of plot to carry you through. And fourth, the reason for telling the story is rather suspect-- would the Spanish King really want to know all the gory details of the lives of the natives prior to his conquest? 'Aztec Autumn' improves on the original in all these respects. There IS a central thread of story to string it all together-- the story of an imaginative and moving, if failed, rebellion. There are no scandalized listeners. The narrator does not delight in shock. The interruptions are fewer and less intrusive, and this time they actually make sense in terms of why the story is being told at all. To summarize then: tighter, more focused storytelling; more sensible framework for the narrative; an even stronger basis in historical reality. All this without sacrificing the 'guilty-pleasures' aspects of the presentation. This sequel is BETTER than 'Aztec,' which is saying a lot.
Rating:
Summary: Gratuitous disappointment
Review: Jennings combines the mastery of storytelling with rock-solid research to present the aftermath of the world of Mixtli as presented in his masterwork, Aztec. Perhaps this book does not present the depth of the previous work, but that can be found in the previous work, and this book continues the story beyond (just beyond) the life of Mixtli. I was (and I hate to use this word) spellbound and wished it were longer.
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