The Columbus Affair: A Novel

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For 500 years historians have pondered the question:

Who was Christopher Columbus?

The answer is simply another question:

Who do you want him to be?

—ANONYMOUS OBSERVER

PROLOGUE

CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS REALIZED THAT THE DECISIVE MOMENT was approaching. His party had trudged south through the lush forest of this tropical land for the past three days, steadily gaining altitude. Of all the islands he’d discovered since that first landfall in October 1492, this was the fairest his eyes had seen. A narrow plain rimmed its rocky coast. Mountains formed a misted spine, rising gradually from the west and culminating here, in the east, at the tortuous chain of peaks now surrounding him. Most of the earth was porous limestone covered by fertile red soil. An incredible array of plants flourished beneath thick stands of old-growth forest, all nourished by constant, moist winds. The natives who lived here called the place Xaymaca, which he’d learned meant “isle of springs”—apt, for water abounded everywhere. Since Castilian substituted a J for X, he’d come to call it Jamaica.

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