“They made me the tongue of conquest—but they never owned my voice.”

Step into the fierce, fragile heart of sixteenth-century Mesoamerica with Tongue of Conquest, the first-person memoir of Malinalli Tenepal—better known to history as La Malinche. Sold into slavery, gifted with unmatched linguistic brilliance, she became the key interpreter, strategist, and cultural mediator to Hernán Cortés during the Spanish conquest of Mexico.

Through Malinalli’s voice, walk the dense riverways of Coatzacoalcos, the obsidian halls of Moctezuma’s court, and the bloodied temples of a city in collapse. Witness how language became both her weapon and her wound, how she navigated trust, betrayal, and survival with each word translated between gods and galleons. Feel the intimate terror of being torn between peoples—Nahuas, Maya, Spaniards—and the impossible burden of being called traitor, savior, slave, and mother of a new world.

Part of the In Their Own Voices: Unfiltered Histories series, this bold and haunting narrative blends Indigenous and Spanish chronicles, cognitive modeling, and feminist historiography to resurrect not only what happened—but how it might have felt to live it. Perfect for readers of Latin American history, women’s resilience, linguistic power, and the tangled roots of colonial identity.

“Turns a symbol into a soul. Malinche doesn’t justify—she reclaims.” – Early Reader Review

Sharp. Torn. Unforgotten. Read Tongue of Conquest and hear the voice history tried to silence.

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