Review
" . . . finally, the truth about the fate of the Kumeyaay Indians of Southern California . . . the only obstacles to Spanish imperialism . . ." --
Dr. Florence Shipek, anthropologist and leader of numerous fights to restore and protect Kumeyaay property and rights; author of "Pushed into the Rocks: Southern California Indian Land Tenure, 1769-1986"" . . . you will never think of the California missions or the padres who ran them without feeling anger." --
Matt Pallamary, author of "Land Without Evil" and workshop leader at the annual Santa Barbara Writers’ Conference"...contravenes the sanitized fiction of benevolent Padres and docile neophytes which all too often is passed off as historical fact." --
Michael Connolly, ecological consultant and Kumeyaay historian; former member of Campo Band Tribal Council
From the Publisher
Quick Sketch of Mission by Margaret Wyman
In the late 18th Century, while those living in the Thirteen Colonies on the East Coast of North America were moving toward throwing off the yoke of Britain’s rule, the indigenous people of what would become San Diego, California, faced an invasion force of Spaniards who would enslave and nearly annihilate them. It’s the autumn of 1767 in the desert east of what is now San Diego, California. WEB, a young Kumeyaay Indian girl, undergoes the rite of passage to womanhood, knowing that she is soon to be wed to a man she has never seen who lives in a distant village by the sea, far from her desert home. Though she hates to leave her home, she looks forward to a new beginning, because an accident of birth has given her webbed fingers, making her the object of ridicule. Despite this ‘defect,’ she is an expert basketmaker, a skill that makes her desirable as a bride and a producer of trade goods. She senses that she is destined to become the agent of immense change in the lives of her people, but she has no idea of when or how. CASTS NO SHADOW, the renowned wekuseyaay rattlesnake shaman, arrives to take Web away to the west, across the mountains to coastal Nipaguay, where his son waits to marry her. Mysterious and respected, Casts No Shadow is the keeper of his people’s oral history and most-sacred rituals as well as the spiritual leader of his band and the conduit through which the Kumeyaays communicate with the world of serpents and the spirits of the underworld. Through his trance visions, he chooses Web to be the wife of his only son and foresees the arrival of both the Spanish and Web’s twin sons, but glimpses only a vague impression of the terrible destiny that awaits his people. SHADOW DANCER, proud and conceited, is in training to become the first aaw-kuseyaay fire-shaman of the Kumeyaay tribe, because he miraculously escaped being burned alive in a prairie fire. Though he wants a wife, he is not pleased at the prospect of a deformed bride, in a marriage arranged by his father, Casts No Shadow, especially since the tribal chieftain’s desirable wife is making eyes at him. Meanwhile, in Lower California, JOSÉ ROMERO, an orphan who has become the catamite of a Jesuit priest, finds himself displaced by a younger and more beautiful boy as the priest’s favorite. Romero catches them in flagrante delicto and flies into a jealous rage, smashing a holy icon. As punishment, the vicious head of the mission guard drags him bodily behind a horse, shredding the flesh from his face and leaving him for dead. Suffering permanent facial disfigurement, he is exiled to the new Misión San Diego, a thousand miles away from where he wants to be. His mind grows as twisted as his face, and he plots his revenge. Based on meticulous research of anthropological and archaeological studies and existing accounts of that period, Mission accurately portrays the untold side of the story of the famed California missions, the state’s number one tourist attraction. Approximately 120,000 words
