War God: Nights of the Witch

Well done mr. Hancock , another brilliantly written and hand woven story that combines historical events with more than likely conclusions derived from countless years of studying . Another thought provoking book from the master of them. Do yourself a favor , buy all his books , wipe all preconceptions from your mind and prepare to learn things that only a life of commitment , study and traveling can teach. 10 stars

It is quite remarkable the way Graham is able spin together multiple narratives that slowly culminate into a captivating story based on historical events. The adage "reality is stranger then fiction" applies here. I found it very interesting the way he captured the superstition and paranoia of the time. Check out "Entangled" by Graham. Another fascinating novel by this precocious novelist!

I bought this book for my husband for Christmas and he loved it so much he MADE me read it. I don't usually have time to read books being the mother of two small children so I put it off for a while but once I found an hour to myself I could not put it down! You should have this in your book collection.

this book is amazing it has everything you want in a book action, adventure, suspense, blood, guts, love, good, evil, and is really really entertaining. I accidentally took this book on vacation with me & I should have just stayed home because all I did was read it the whole time!!!!

Wow! This novel kept my attention and interest all the way through. I felt the walls of my apartment disappear and I was easily able to imagine the character voices and actions. Every once in awhile I felt as if Moctezuma was aware of my curious presence.
Thank you for your ingenious way of combining fact and fiction! You have an awesome imagination. I am so looking forward to the next installment.

I cannot recommend this book enough. It perfectly executes its thesis. I was wary at first to give it a try because, well, I'm a prose snob and while I love Hancock's work I didn't know if he could hack it in fiction. HE CAN!!!!!!!!!!! YAAAAAYYYYY!!!
His prose is tight and his plot is tighter. Effin thrilling!

Graham Hancock is a gangster. I loved this book, he mends fiction and non seamlessly. Great character development, I don't know what the low reviews were talking about. GH even includes a Character Glossary! Couldn't put the book down.

The book is historically accurate yet he adds a couple of fascinating characters to the tale which help explain the event on a level I had never considered. The book is a page turner like his last book "Entangled". It is non stop action... love it so far. I'm about 75% done with it.

Graham Hancock has once again turned mere pages into a dimensional gateway and brought us face to face with scenes both horrific and wondrous. I thoroughly enjoyed War God: Nights Of The Witch and eagerly await its sequel. MORE!!

Both books kicked a$$! Very intriguing read, never a slow point. How the different view points start coming together is awesome. I had to get the sequel right away when I finished this one. Great books!

I have followed Hancock ever since his Quest For The Lost Civilizations series. He has become an essential guide and resource in my career in the humanities. I'm beginning to read War God, I'm completely taken by it, so well informed and entertaining at the same time, what a gem of a book. Thanks Graham for all you do, SO necessary. William, Saint Paul, Minnesota.

So well written with so much factual detail by an author by an author of true genius, it is the best book I've read in years. It helps that I have always been fascinated with that era and that part of the world.

I really enjoyed this enthralling story. Graham Hancock has done a great job of taking readers on an adventure through an fantastical imagining of our past. Thoroughly looking forward to reading the sequel.

While Graham Hancock took some liberties with dates and facts to tighten up the timeline of this first book of a trilogy on the Conquest of Mexico to cover a 2 month period from 18 February 1519 to 18 April 1519. The main character (in my opinion) is Tozi, a 14 year old Mexica orphan who is just beginning to learn how to control the supernatural powers she can manifest. And of course Malinal who we know as Malinche or Dona Marina is a beautiful Mayan princess who was sold by her mother into slavery to the Mexica. The Spanish characters include Pepillo, a 14 year old Spanish orphan raised and educated in a Dominican monastery and appointed page to a pedophile Dominican friar who is Inquisitor for the expedition. Hernando Cortez is commander of the expedition. He is a brilliant military commander and politician that is totally ruthless, Machiavellian and clever.

The battle of Potonchan, in which 400 Spaniards with cannon, matchlocks, crossbows, war dogs and armored horses destroyed a Mayan army of 40,000 is extensively described as in the Conquistadores accounts.

A well written historical novel such as this can bring history to life and I did appreciate that Graham did explain in the back of the book the liberties he took with dates and events.

While the novel does include some fantasy we should remember that religious dogma, superstition and belief in supernatural powers was very much a part of life in the 16th and 17th centuries, up through the Salem Witch Trials.

Fascinating subject matter and extensively researched. Hancock could tighten up his dialogue a bit though, it's a little simplistic at times. I will definitely read the next books in the series. Thanks for the signed bookplate Graham!

Beautiful Book! I have not finished reading it yet, but so far, I love it. I really like the way the author uses his vast knowledge of history and is able to weave an unbelievably believable fictional account of this time in history.

Brutal reality of the beginning stages in the conquest of Mexico. Provides a rich and interesting story to supplement a foggy historical event- one with catastrophic consequences that changed the face of mankind. Keeps you perpetually on the edge of your seat!

Loaded with historical interest, flows through time with perfect ease, reads like you transported to the foot of the pyramid and stand looking up into the eyes of some of the most interesting yet frightening souls that mankind has produced.

Loved it. Really enjoyed the mix of historical facts and fictional elements. Looking forward to part 2. I'm sure Cortes vs Monteczuma will be extremely entertaining. Eager to see he the roles of Pepillo, Tozi, and Malinal play out

First of all, I've read several reviews from other readers complaining about the gory nature of this book. I think many of these readers fail to understand how gruesome and violent these times were, and Graham did a spectacular job depicting this in his first novel. I agree that there should be more to a story told than violence for the sake of violence, however, I don't believe that was the point here. Even though this is fiction (but based on history), I think this story would have been impossible to tell properly WITHOUT the gore. So I would like to caution any potential readers, if you don't want to read about violence and gore, this book may not be for you. In fact, maybe you should not be reading about the Spanish Conquest at all.
That said, I thoroughly enjoyed this novel! I've been a fan of Mr. Hancock since I first read the by now classic "Fingerprints of the Gods", and have very much grown to appreciate his thought provoking, thoroughly researched compilations regarding some of human history's greatest mysteries. This novel is well imagined by a very skilled researcher, who paints a captivating picture of what was indeed a very dark and bloody time in our history.

I heard about this book through the author's interview with the Joe Rogan Experience and it did not dissapoint. I love fiction that lives off the breadth of hitorical possibilities and this clearly accomplishes that. Looking forward to reading the Graham's past catalog and upcoming offerings.

Excellent! I like the 4 story lines and perspective from different sides. Good to see factual relationship to history. Nothing has held my attention like this since reading the hunger games series. Can hardly wait for the next book in the series.

This is a fascinating read, I picked up this book before leaving to my trip to Mexico. The story line is so engaging and the converging of actual historical facts and fantasy completes the experience. I cannot wait for the next book in the series.

_munish vashist

Riveting and compelling. A fantastic journey through one of the most epic conquests in human history! Graham Hancock wonderfully combines historical fact with fiction to create a truly wonderful novel!

I have heard Graham Hancock speak a few times (the Joe Rogan Experience, Duncan Trussell Family Hour, TED talks) and really liked his style of communication and perspective on things. This is the first of his books that I have read and I thoroughly enjoyed it. You get an exciting take on these historical events and Hancock tells the story in a way that quickly played out in my mind like a movie.

I found I liked this subject matter so much that I went back and watched "Apocalypto" and this book tells a much more detailed and engaging story of a similar period in time. So, if you were at all interested in that movie, I think you would really enjoy this book.

The book is very violent, in a very realistic way. It makes you realize how violent the times were and when you hear about Cortes "conquering" or Columbus "discovering" how bloody the reality of those events must have really been.

In the true test of a good book, I'm sad now that its finished. Well done, Graham Hancock, I look forward to the next one!

Graham Hancock mixes historical fact with an exciting tale in "WAR GOD: Night of the Witch." I discovered Mr. Hancock from the "Joe Rogan Experience" podcast. I look forward to the next book in this series.

Fun book, the battle scenes get the blood flowing. This book brings a more personal feel to the actual history, while maintaining a good balance of the supernatural elements graham wanted to introduce. All in all one of the better books I've read in a while.

I greatly appreciated the author's balanced approach. He successfully presented all sides of the conflicts in the novel with believable characters who have strengths and weakness, good and bad aspects. Most treatments of historically-based conflicts are clearly biased toward one side or the other. I have studied the history of the Mexican conquest by Spain. War God added a new dimension to my understanding of the historical facts, kind of a "you are there", through the use of the fictional/historical characters. One word of warning - the violence and gore are extreme, probably very accurately so.

3+ stars

Graham Hancock has written an engrossing page turner of a historical fantasy novel about the great transition of Mexican culture when the Spanish conquistadors arrived in the early 16th century. This novel, which is 534 pages long but reads very fast, is set within a period of just a couple of months in early 1519; Part 1 taking place in just a single day - switching in short chapters between 3 different Aztec groups, one based around the ruling Montezuma, the other openly rebelling, and the third a small yet powerful group of slaves based around a young witch, and the Spanish getting ready to set sail on a voyage of discovery and conquest from Cuba., and Part 2 being mostly a more detailed telling of the Spanish point of view as they encounter the Mayans.

Historically the story seems pretty accurate, graphically depicting the degenerate human-sacrifice obsessed Aztecs ("Mexica") as well as the efficient warrior conquistadors driven by lust for gold and glory for God. Basically the tale is of clashing cultures (European and American), each with their share of rigid cultural hierarchies, all powerful religions and violent norms. But there are enough twists that unite these two cultures to make for an interesting tale.

Hancock is not a great novelist, but as a pulp fiction writer he is entertaining, and this novel (his second) is noticeable more mature than his first (Entangled: The Eater of Souls), with less vulgar dialogue and less violent and warped sexuality. War Gods has though plenty of graphic and detailed violence - in the human sacrifices of part 1 and the massive battles of part 2. I often got the feeling this is probably a "guy novel", more of a modern telling of the swash-buckling adventure stories that have been staples of young adult males for centuries.

However while the writing seems better than Entangled the plot was actually less interesting (less cosmically involved and psychologically complex). There were many small historical details that hinted of Hancock's extensive archeological studies (the 72 steps up the Mayan pyramid for instance), as well as the clothes, architecture and weapons used, and he incorporates them smoothly. But while this story has amazing detail and exciting momentum, it ends up building to somewhat of an anticlimax. I felt something was missing - an ending perhaps. This is exactly what happened with Entangled but there we were given the promise of it being the first in a trilogy of stories (maybe he has the same plan for this story, but I'd rather he finish the Entangled trilogy first). Here we're left at the end, with just a summary to let us know how historically accurate the previous tale has been. I don't regret reading the novel, but I also am not too eager for a continuation of the story either, and in the end felt dissatisfied after all the build up of excitement... mainly it gives you some vivid information to think about, the degeneracy of the Mexican cultures and the somewhat missed opportunity of the Spanish to bring a more enlightening change to the New World. This different perspective on the Spanish is the best part for me.

I typically enjoy non-fiction, but when I do read fiction, it's usually historical fiction. Graham Hancock writes artfully as per usual and has made the transition from non-fiction writer to fiction seem effortless.

Hancock's re-visioning of the era shows his usual informed insight into history. A rich plot and moving scenes make this a great read for people who wants to be entertained, intrigued, and have their minds expanded. You'll never see Mexico's past the same way again.

I found this book to be complex and its characters captivating. I appreciated the multiple layers of characters and how they interacted with one another. I wish to know more about where the characters go from here!