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Toltec Dawn
Convert Fergus mac Ogma, a youthful Irish acolyte of the god Tezcatlipoca, has a burning desire and will to become more than a native underling in a land controlled by the invaders from across the ocean. But Tezcatlipoca altars are scarlet from the living sacrafice of his Christian countrymen and the time is coming when his own blood might be demanded to seal his choice.
Captain Mixcoatl is settling in with his wife as commander of the Toltec fort at St Albans in the province of England. When the governor strips the province of troops to invade the Continent he’s left with a skeleton force to hold the colony against the opportunistic invasion of the Scots.
Rowena, the young Saxon girl, is fleeing England with her uncle the monk and attempting to reach the Continent across the Channel. Thwarted, her uncle dead, Rowena finds herself a slave in Mixcoatl’s household. But when she’s taken by Normans supporting the Scots she’ll have to decide where her loyalties lay.
In the uneasy aftermath of the Toltec conquest of Ireland and England, three lives gradually become entwined. Facing a new invasion of an already conquered land, they are forced to confront the truth of where their loyalties lie.
Captain Mixcoatl is settling in with his wife as commander of the Toltec fort at St Albans in the province of England. When the governor strips the province of troops to invade the Continent he’s left with a skeleton force to hold the colony against the opportunistic invasion of the Scots.
Rowena, the young Saxon girl, is fleeing England with her uncle the monk and attempting to reach the Continent across the Channel. Thwarted, her uncle dead, Rowena finds herself a slave in Mixcoatl’s household. But when she’s taken by Normans supporting the Scots she’ll have to decide where her loyalties lay.
In the uneasy aftermath of the Toltec conquest of Ireland and England, three lives gradually become entwined. Facing a new invasion of an already conquered land, they are forced to confront the truth of where their loyalties lie.
388 pages, Paperback
Published February 1, 2024
1 person is currently reading
2 people want to read
About the author
R.J. Hore
43 books50 followers2026 brings a new publisher (Shipwreck Publishing) and new novels! Perils of Paul, a fantasy adventure will be coming out this April (2026) and soon to follow Flight of Fancy, a sci fi romance.
Since August 2024, I have twenty books in paperback and eBook format. Twelve Novellas that are available as separate eBooks as well as collection of four volumes containing three each of the novellas, The Housetrap Chronicles Omnibus Volumes 1-4.
My newer stand-alone novels, Summer in Paradise, a paranormal thriller, and Dark Candle, an 18+ tale of sex, murder and hypnotic regression are available in paperback and eBook as well as We’re Not in Kansas and Alex in Wanderland.
I have fittingly three trilogies, The Queen’s trilogy which contains the Queen’s Pawn, the Queen’s Man and The Queen’s Game. The Daughter’s series contains Of Destiny’s Daughters, Hammers Across the Stars and Expeditions to Earth. And finally, The Dark Lady trilogy, beginning with The Dark Lady, Dark Days and Dark Knights.
You can often find me at local markets in Winnipeg and the surrounding area including Winnipeg's Keycon, check out my Instagram page to keep up with my latest adventures and where you might find me next!
You can also discover more on my website, Instagram, TikTok and Facebook, I love to hear from fans of my work!
Since August 2024, I have twenty books in paperback and eBook format. Twelve Novellas that are available as separate eBooks as well as collection of four volumes containing three each of the novellas, The Housetrap Chronicles Omnibus Volumes 1-4.
My newer stand-alone novels, Summer in Paradise, a paranormal thriller, and Dark Candle, an 18+ tale of sex, murder and hypnotic regression are available in paperback and eBook as well as We’re Not in Kansas and Alex in Wanderland.
I have fittingly three trilogies, The Queen’s trilogy which contains the Queen’s Pawn, the Queen’s Man and The Queen’s Game. The Daughter’s series contains Of Destiny’s Daughters, Hammers Across the Stars and Expeditions to Earth. And finally, The Dark Lady trilogy, beginning with The Dark Lady, Dark Days and Dark Knights.
You can often find me at local markets in Winnipeg and the surrounding area including Winnipeg's Keycon, check out my Instagram page to keep up with my latest adventures and where you might find me next!
You can also discover more on my website, Instagram, TikTok and Facebook, I love to hear from fans of my work!
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
June 17, 2022
This review was first published on Kurt's Frontier.
Synopsis:
Toltec Dawn follows the adventures of three people. Fergus mac Ogma is an Irish man who has become an acolyte to the god Tezcatlipoca. His ambitions have put many Christians on Tozcatlipoca’s alters. How much and who is he willing to sacrifice. Captain Mixcoatl commands a Toltec garrison at St. Alban’s near London. When the governor strips England’s garrisons to attempt another invasion of the continent, the Scots see an opportunity. Rowena is a Saxon girl who finds herself as part of Captain Mixcoatl’s household. When Normans who support the Scots’ invasions take her, she finds her loyalties tested.
Review:
Toltec Dawn uses an author’s greatest tool: the question “What if …?”
Suppose Chinese traders had visited the Toltec empire and given them the knowledge of metalworking, firearms, and how to travel across the ocean. Suppose the Toltecs invaded the British Isles intending to conquer Europe. While my specialty in archaeology is not Mesoamerica, I know something about Mesoamerican archaeology and found the story intriguing. R. J. Hore moved the contact period from the Sixteenth to the Thirteenth Century and reversed it, with Native American troops trying to convert the “heathen Christians.”
The storytelling was good, and the concept was intriguing. While R. J. Hore opted for an episodic structure for the story, with no clear protagonist, it was enjoyable.
Synopsis:
Toltec Dawn follows the adventures of three people. Fergus mac Ogma is an Irish man who has become an acolyte to the god Tezcatlipoca. His ambitions have put many Christians on Tozcatlipoca’s alters. How much and who is he willing to sacrifice. Captain Mixcoatl commands a Toltec garrison at St. Alban’s near London. When the governor strips England’s garrisons to attempt another invasion of the continent, the Scots see an opportunity. Rowena is a Saxon girl who finds herself as part of Captain Mixcoatl’s household. When Normans who support the Scots’ invasions take her, she finds her loyalties tested.
Review:
Toltec Dawn uses an author’s greatest tool: the question “What if …?”
Suppose Chinese traders had visited the Toltec empire and given them the knowledge of metalworking, firearms, and how to travel across the ocean. Suppose the Toltecs invaded the British Isles intending to conquer Europe. While my specialty in archaeology is not Mesoamerica, I know something about Mesoamerican archaeology and found the story intriguing. R. J. Hore moved the contact period from the Sixteenth to the Thirteenth Century and reversed it, with Native American troops trying to convert the “heathen Christians.”
The storytelling was good, and the concept was intriguing. While R. J. Hore opted for an episodic structure for the story, with no clear protagonist, it was enjoyable.
November 22, 2023
R.J. Hore’s Toltec Conquests trilogy, Toltec Dawn, Toltec Khan, and Toltec Noon needs to be taken as a whole—the novels can’t really stand alone. That said, they offer an engaging and rich alternate-history tale with an irresistible colonialism-flipped-backward concept: in the Middle Ages the Toltec civilization of Central America and Mexico sails across the Atlantic and conquers the British Isles! The trilogy takes place in the early 1200’s AD and its story of racial politics, religious strife, and numerous battles is peopled with well-drawn characters like the honourable Toltec general Mixcoatl and his formidable wife Bright Macaw, the brave Saxon girl Rowena, the cunning and amoral Irish priest Fergus, and notable appearances by the likes of Robyn, Earl of Locksley and others of history (and myth).
R.J. Hore weaves his characters together nicely and holds up a compelling mirror to the way European history actually played out.
It’s well worth taking the journey with him.
R.J. Hore weaves his characters together nicely and holds up a compelling mirror to the way European history actually played out.
It’s well worth taking the journey with him.
December 5, 2017
I beta read this years ago, back when it and Book #2 in its sequence made one long novel. Too long for this publisher, so he was advised to split the books in half, and "encouraged" to turn it into a series, of which a third book is currently in the works.
The premise is essentially if the pre-Aztecs made contact with the Chinese and obtained gunpowder, then started expansion over the Atlantic, effectively colonizing the UK under the initial premise of driving out the normans (Vikings). The story follows the viewpoints of three different characters: Fergus, an Irish Priest dedicated to Tezcatlipoca at odds with his Christian family, Mixcoatl, a high-ranking officer of the military base of St. Albans, and Rowena, an orphaned saxon-girl who initially hates the Toltecs as oppressors.
Mixcoatl and Rowena's stories intertwine the most often and while Mixcoatl is about dealing with the issues both foreign and domestic to keep the peace locally, Rowena is the most empathetic character. Her story is complicated by initially being oppressed by local Toltec forces, fleeing and seeking refuge with Saxons, only to find out they meant to sell her off to a brothel and being rescued by Chichimecas, to nearly being raped by one of them, to being saved by Mixcoatl, who arranges for her to safely work at his fort under the watchful eye of his trusted workers. It's a nice balance of realizing that there were good and bad people on both sides, with obvious people taking advantage of who they could, as well as there being some benefits to expansion (allowing the peasants to hunt) and empirical goods (maize and potatoes from "the empire") to say nothing of the superior firepowers of the Toltecs completely driving away viking raids. Rowena's loyalties are tested when she starts to aid a French Knight who, a month prior she would have had every undying devotion, but seeing him commit brutalities in an ends-justifies-the-means has her reassess her view of the world and her place in it.
Unfortunately, this left little time for the development of the religious side of things. The Fergus-Centric plot delves into religion being used as a means of expansion of power, and how the Christians' fears of ending up sacrificed as well as the Crusades of the middle east also taking place, although it's only briefly mentioned in this novel. Because the plot with Rowena and Mixcoatl moved so quickly, it felt like Fergus's plot was there to balance out the world building rather than be a story in its own right.
In general, it's a fast read and my main complaint was that it could have spent more time on characters and been just a little thicker, but it doesn't feel like it's only half a book or that we're left with a massive cliffhanger. In general, I think if you like historical fiction and alternative history, to give it a go, but if you don't like politics or demand exact historical accuracy (alternative history makes you upset) it's probably not up your alley. It's probably best to be somewhat familiar with the history of the era, but the author includes some information so if you're like me, and know more about the Aztecs than the Toltecs, you won't be completely lost.
The premise is essentially if the pre-Aztecs made contact with the Chinese and obtained gunpowder, then started expansion over the Atlantic, effectively colonizing the UK under the initial premise of driving out the normans (Vikings). The story follows the viewpoints of three different characters: Fergus, an Irish Priest dedicated to Tezcatlipoca at odds with his Christian family, Mixcoatl, a high-ranking officer of the military base of St. Albans, and Rowena, an orphaned saxon-girl who initially hates the Toltecs as oppressors.
Mixcoatl and Rowena's stories intertwine the most often and while Mixcoatl is about dealing with the issues both foreign and domestic to keep the peace locally, Rowena is the most empathetic character. Her story is complicated by initially being oppressed by local Toltec forces, fleeing and seeking refuge with Saxons, only to find out they meant to sell her off to a brothel and being rescued by Chichimecas, to nearly being raped by one of them, to being saved by Mixcoatl, who arranges for her to safely work at his fort under the watchful eye of his trusted workers. It's a nice balance of realizing that there were good and bad people on both sides, with obvious people taking advantage of who they could, as well as there being some benefits to expansion (allowing the peasants to hunt) and empirical goods (maize and potatoes from "the empire") to say nothing of the superior firepowers of the Toltecs completely driving away viking raids. Rowena's loyalties are tested when she starts to aid a French Knight who, a month prior she would have had every undying devotion, but seeing him commit brutalities in an ends-justifies-the-means has her reassess her view of the world and her place in it.
Unfortunately, this left little time for the development of the religious side of things. The Fergus-Centric plot delves into religion being used as a means of expansion of power, and how the Christians' fears of ending up sacrificed as well as the Crusades of the middle east also taking place, although it's only briefly mentioned in this novel. Because the plot with Rowena and Mixcoatl moved so quickly, it felt like Fergus's plot was there to balance out the world building rather than be a story in its own right.
In general, it's a fast read and my main complaint was that it could have spent more time on characters and been just a little thicker, but it doesn't feel like it's only half a book or that we're left with a massive cliffhanger. In general, I think if you like historical fiction and alternative history, to give it a go, but if you don't like politics or demand exact historical accuracy (alternative history makes you upset) it's probably not up your alley. It's probably best to be somewhat familiar with the history of the era, but the author includes some information so if you're like me, and know more about the Aztecs than the Toltecs, you won't be completely lost.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews