What do you think?
Rate this book
The Lost Cities of El Norte: Coronado’s Quest, the Unconquered West, and the Birth of American Indian Resistance
Not yet published
Expected 14 Apr 26By the bestselling author of Astoria, a thrilling and masterfully crafted narrative of the Conquistador Francisco Coronado's expedition across 2,500 miles of the vast uncharted North American interior--"El Norte Misterioso" --where he was turned back by fierce indigenous resistance that would thwart white rule for the next three hundred years.
In 1540, the grandest exploring expedition ever assembled in the Americas paraded north from the ruins of the Aztec capital Tenochtitlan, a glittering column of 2,000 men heading into the unknown. Their destination was El Norte Misterioso--The Mysterious North, present-day United States--where fabulous cities of gold were rumored to shine beyond the horizon. Two years later, survivors began stumbling back, half dead. Lost to poisoned arrows, brutal deserts, starvation, cold, desertion, and countless other hardships, 90% of those who left would never return.
Led by Francisco Coronado and backed by the full weight of the Spanish empire, the superpower of its day, they had expected to seize the land, steal its riches, and subjugate its peoples, just as they had so recently done to the mighty Aztec and Inca empires. But instead they encountered the unconquered American West, populated by complex societies of indigenous nations, masters of a vast and unforgiving landscape who fiercely resisted this European "incursion" onto their lands.
Coronado and his people traversed 2,500 miles of unmapped terrain, ranging across the present-day U.S. states of California, Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, Oklahoma, and finally Kansas. They were the first Europeans to gaze upon the Grand Canyon and the Rocky Mountains; made first contact with the Puebloan peoples; crossed the Sonoran Desert and the Great Plains, where they encountered endless herds of bison and the nomadic tribes who followed them. After leading the largest exploring cavalcade ever assembled in the New World, wearing his gilded armor and bobbing plume, Coronado retreated back to Mexico City two years later accompanied only by a hundred or so hangers-on and carried on a litter, a broken man. America's Southwest and Plains would remain unconquered for the next 300 years.
In 1540, the grandest exploring expedition ever assembled in the Americas paraded north from the ruins of the Aztec capital Tenochtitlan, a glittering column of 2,000 men heading into the unknown. Their destination was El Norte Misterioso--The Mysterious North, present-day United States--where fabulous cities of gold were rumored to shine beyond the horizon. Two years later, survivors began stumbling back, half dead. Lost to poisoned arrows, brutal deserts, starvation, cold, desertion, and countless other hardships, 90% of those who left would never return.
Led by Francisco Coronado and backed by the full weight of the Spanish empire, the superpower of its day, they had expected to seize the land, steal its riches, and subjugate its peoples, just as they had so recently done to the mighty Aztec and Inca empires. But instead they encountered the unconquered American West, populated by complex societies of indigenous nations, masters of a vast and unforgiving landscape who fiercely resisted this European "incursion" onto their lands.
Coronado and his people traversed 2,500 miles of unmapped terrain, ranging across the present-day U.S. states of California, Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, Oklahoma, and finally Kansas. They were the first Europeans to gaze upon the Grand Canyon and the Rocky Mountains; made first contact with the Puebloan peoples; crossed the Sonoran Desert and the Great Plains, where they encountered endless herds of bison and the nomadic tribes who followed them. After leading the largest exploring cavalcade ever assembled in the New World, wearing his gilded armor and bobbing plume, Coronado retreated back to Mexico City two years later accompanied only by a hundred or so hangers-on and carried on a litter, a broken man. America's Southwest and Plains would remain unconquered for the next 300 years.
432 pages, Hardcover
Expected publication April 14, 2026
2 people are currently reading
245 people want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
Review of advance copy received from Netgalley
Did you know that there was a time when Spanish conquistadors were actively not trying to be murderous to American Indians? Yes, they failed like almost every other time, but it did happen! It was 1540 in Mexico and the conquistador Francisco Coronado undertook an expedition to "El Norte Misterioso." Of course, the target was anyplace where they could find a lot of gold. It was always gold with these guys. Well, they would have settled for some nice places to set up shop with abundant water and good land. What they found was the Puebloan peoples who were pretty accommodating...until they weren't. You see, the Spanish around this time had this uncanny knack for overstaying their welcome and taking advantage of good hospitality. The Spanish did get to see the Grand Canyon, though. Most people say it's worth the trouble. Coronado probably didn't agree.
Lucky for us readers, this story is being told by the wonderful Peter Stark in The Lost Cities of El Norte: Coronado’s Quest, the Unconquered West, and the Birth of American Indian Resistance. I quote the whole title and subtitle because I do love it when the entire thing makes sense to the story. Stark is no stranger to adventure stories which contain a fair bit of bad luck, violence, and malice. For my fellow readers who read Stark's Astoria, this is like an old friend coming back home. Stark still has the ability to make the writing come alive whether it's gazing upon an unending group of bison, enduring unquenchable thirst, or the way a poison arrow makes your arm fall off. Yes, all of those examples are in the book.
I am not sure I remember this from Stark's previous books, but he also seems to have added a willingness to lighten the mood with some modern vernacular. Don't worry, this is not a case of an author forcing contemporary sayings into the story directly. Instead, he'll give a kind of wink to the reader and say this is the 1500s equivalent of a modern idea. The story kind of needs it. Conquistadors are not known for their sense of humor, and there is no shortage of tragedy in the pages of this narrative. This is a brutal story of an even more brutal journey. The real surprise is that anyone survived at all. As I would say of any of Stark's books, don't miss this one. It's too good.
(This book was provided as an advance reader copy by NetGalley and Mariner Books.)
Lucky for us readers, this story is being told by the wonderful Peter Stark in The Lost Cities of El Norte: Coronado’s Quest, the Unconquered West, and the Birth of American Indian Resistance. I quote the whole title and subtitle because I do love it when the entire thing makes sense to the story. Stark is no stranger to adventure stories which contain a fair bit of bad luck, violence, and malice. For my fellow readers who read Stark's Astoria, this is like an old friend coming back home. Stark still has the ability to make the writing come alive whether it's gazing upon an unending group of bison, enduring unquenchable thirst, or the way a poison arrow makes your arm fall off. Yes, all of those examples are in the book.
I am not sure I remember this from Stark's previous books, but he also seems to have added a willingness to lighten the mood with some modern vernacular. Don't worry, this is not a case of an author forcing contemporary sayings into the story directly. Instead, he'll give a kind of wink to the reader and say this is the 1500s equivalent of a modern idea. The story kind of needs it. Conquistadors are not known for their sense of humor, and there is no shortage of tragedy in the pages of this narrative. This is a brutal story of an even more brutal journey. The real surprise is that anyone survived at all. As I would say of any of Stark's books, don't miss this one. It's too good.
(This book was provided as an advance reader copy by NetGalley and Mariner Books.)
Review of advance copy received from NetGalley
Out here, in the heart of the continent, one can imagine Don Francisco Vazquez de Coronado isolated like Captain Kurtz in his lone outpost up the Congo River, European rescue parties searching for him in this vast blankness on the map. from The Lost Cities of El Norte
Coronado risked his wife’s fortune for an expedition into the unknown world hoping to discover the rumored Seven Cities filled with gold. A huge regiment of two thousand conquistadors and their Aztec slaves set off from Mexico City into today’s Southwest American desert. Ships sailed up the Baja coast with supplies, believing the two parties would meet up. They never did.
The expedition encountered fierce heat and bitter cold, suffered starvation, and encountered resistant indigenous people with poisonous arrows that rotted flesh off the bone. They were the first Europeans to see the Grand Canyon, the Great Plains, and herds of bison. They reintroduced the horse to North America, the native population having become extinct.
It’s a story of hubris and greed, suffering and failure, the beginning of Native American resistance and ingenuity. A page-turner filled with drama and startling insight. Stark notes how close Coronado came to changing history, returning to Mexico City, in ill health and dejected, while had be traveled a hundred miles more and he would have found the great wealth and civilization of Cahokia and fertile lands.
Abuse of native populations was forbidden by the king, and those who returned were charged of war crimes. His health broken, Coronado died a few years after his return, a failure.
Thanks to Mariner Books for a free book through NetGalley.
Coronado risked his wife’s fortune for an expedition into the unknown world hoping to discover the rumored Seven Cities filled with gold. A huge regiment of two thousand conquistadors and their Aztec slaves set off from Mexico City into today’s Southwest American desert. Ships sailed up the Baja coast with supplies, believing the two parties would meet up. They never did.
The expedition encountered fierce heat and bitter cold, suffered starvation, and encountered resistant indigenous people with poisonous arrows that rotted flesh off the bone. They were the first Europeans to see the Grand Canyon, the Great Plains, and herds of bison. They reintroduced the horse to North America, the native population having become extinct.
It’s a story of hubris and greed, suffering and failure, the beginning of Native American resistance and ingenuity. A page-turner filled with drama and startling insight. Stark notes how close Coronado came to changing history, returning to Mexico City, in ill health and dejected, while had be traveled a hundred miles more and he would have found the great wealth and civilization of Cahokia and fertile lands.
Abuse of native populations was forbidden by the king, and those who returned were charged of war crimes. His health broken, Coronado died a few years after his return, a failure.
Thanks to Mariner Books for a free book through NetGalley.
Review of advance copy received from Netgalley
Growing up I was always intrigued by Coronado’s search for the lost cities of gold, so I was pleasantly surprised to receive this ARC (thank you NetGalley and Mariner Books) and find answers to my history buff self.
First, this is such a well written book making it engagingly easy to read. So those you interested in history but thinking history books are dull, this book will definitely changed your mind. It’s got all the makings of a good thriller too.
In 1540, Coronado left Tenochitilan, the ruined capital of the Aztecs, with 2,000 men heading to El Norte Misterioso - present day US - where there reports of fabled cities of gold. Two years later survivors started returning, half death (90% of the expedition were lost).
While Cortez and Pizarro may have easily conquered the indigenous peoples of the territories they came upon, Coronado met up with fierce indigenous people who resisted these invaders and “a vast unforgiving landscape” that proved unconquerable. Coronado and his men travelled 2500 miles and as far as Kansas in their expedition. They meet endless bisons and nomadic people but the fabled cities eluded them. Coronado returned a broken man and the American Southwest and Plains people remained unconquered for 300 years.
This is a fine history read. It reminded me of Samuel Shellabarger’s marvelous novel, The Captain from Castile, which follows Cortez to Mexico. There these romantic figures of the foregone times are larger than life but in reality as this book shows, they were men of greed with feet of sand trying to earn fame, only to discover fame may be elusive.
Highly recommend.
First, this is such a well written book making it engagingly easy to read. So those you interested in history but thinking history books are dull, this book will definitely changed your mind. It’s got all the makings of a good thriller too.
In 1540, Coronado left Tenochitilan, the ruined capital of the Aztecs, with 2,000 men heading to El Norte Misterioso - present day US - where there reports of fabled cities of gold. Two years later survivors started returning, half death (90% of the expedition were lost).
While Cortez and Pizarro may have easily conquered the indigenous peoples of the territories they came upon, Coronado met up with fierce indigenous people who resisted these invaders and “a vast unforgiving landscape” that proved unconquerable. Coronado and his men travelled 2500 miles and as far as Kansas in their expedition. They meet endless bisons and nomadic people but the fabled cities eluded them. Coronado returned a broken man and the American Southwest and Plains people remained unconquered for 300 years.
This is a fine history read. It reminded me of Samuel Shellabarger’s marvelous novel, The Captain from Castile, which follows Cortez to Mexico. There these romantic figures of the foregone times are larger than life but in reality as this book shows, they were men of greed with feet of sand trying to earn fame, only to discover fame may be elusive.
Highly recommend.
March 30, 2026
To say that the Age of Exploration was a fascinating time would be quite an understatement. There’s a certain lunacy that comes with barreling headlong into the unknown, and doing so with the confidence that your fortune awaits. There’s an incredible courage that is needed to know what you don’t know and yet still risk everything (wealth, reputation, life) on exploration. And then there is also an arrogance needed to venture out into lands that are most likely already inhabited, in the aims of claiming said land and those things in it as your own rightful treasure. The Spanish Conquistadors of the 16th century had all of these traits, and each expedition came with global reverberations. This book details the journey of Coronado’s ill fated march across 300,000 square miles (!!!), returning with empty pockets and images of lands never before seen by Europeans, and some that would remain unseen for another 200 years. The book is quite fascinating, and it is apparent that while there are instances where we only have our imaginations to fill in the actual facts, the author has done painstaking research to piece together and retrace those footsteps first taken over 480 years ago. Thank you to NetGalley, Mariner Books, and HarperCollins for an advanced reader’s copy.
Review of advance copy received from Publisher
An interesting look at a strange mission into the unknown territory of everything north of Mexico. El Norte Misterioso was a quest by Francisco Coronado to expand (conquer) the native population and mineral rich land just as the Spanish had done in Mexico. Not knowing what to expect and going off of a report of a city of gold they were ill prepared for the harsh terrain, the sheer size (2500 miles) and that the peoples they met might not understand what they wanted or give up easily. The author does a great job of setting the scene especially what it must have looked like for the native people to see horses and men head to toe in metal for the first time screaming latin at them or other languages that they had no way of understanding. Coronado was desperate to make this his claim to fame and impress his mother in law as well as the Spanish but it did not go as planned. To think that this began in 1540 and the native people lived there unbothered once more until the westward expansion.
This story will resonate with history lovers and those who enjoyed Erik Larson's storytelling.
My thanks to the publisher for the advance copy.
This story will resonate with history lovers and those who enjoyed Erik Larson's storytelling.
My thanks to the publisher for the advance copy.
Review of advance copy received from NetGalley
About Francisco Coronado’s expedition in 1540 from the Aztec capital of Tenochtitlan north into what is now the United States. Stories about gold lured Coronado and his 2,000 men across 2,500 miles of unknown lands battling indigenous people along the way, who skillfully resisted in ways Coronado and his men never imagined. Along the way they discovered the Grand Canyon and the Rocky Mountains and encountered among others the Puebloan peoples and so much. However, after two grueling years, they returned to where they began two years later unsuccessfully in their quest to find gold. Coronado returned physically battered with most of his men dead. I liked how the author gave voice to the characters, which made them came alive across the pages. Overall, the book was interesting, providing a window into the many indigenous people, as well as that time and place in history across the vast lands that are today California, Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, Oklahoma, and Kansas. Many thanks to the author, publisher, and NetGalley for the opportunity to read and review this book.
Review of advance copy received from Netgalley
The book is about Conquistador Francisco Coronado’s 1540 expedition across upper Mexico and North America. Their destination was El Norte Misterioso. It was an exciting and well researched read. Two thousand men were marching into the unknown expecting to find vast wealth, where fabulous cities of gold were rumored to be there. This was a century before the pilgrims landed at Plymouth Rock. The Conquistador were always chasing gold. They run up against the indigenous nations of the new lands. They were worn down pushing their way though the new lands. Ninety per cent never make it back. History is my favorite subject and this is a great lesson. I would like to thank NetGalley
and HarperCollins for a free advance copy.
and HarperCollins for a free advance copy.
Read
February 12, 2026review text for 93
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews