River of Darkness: Francisco Orellana’s Legendary Voyage of Death and Discovery Down the Amazon [2011] – ★★★1/2

After the success of the Spanish conquests under Cortés and Francisco Pizarro, much thirst still remained for the New World and all energy was thrown to discovering one thing that still stirred the imagination, making men restless – the mythical El Dorado, the City of Gold supposedly tucked away somewhere in South America. This non-fiction talks about the exploration of the New World by Francisco Orellana (1511-1546), a conquistador from Extremadura, Spain, who teamed up with his kinsman Gonzalo Pizarro in search of the City of Gold, and sailed down the entire length of the Amazon River in 1541, becoming the first ever European to do so. Levy’s narrative often reads like an exciting adventure story, rather than a historical non-fiction, and has certainly filled the gap in popular accounts of this part of the Spanish conquests.

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