It was an exhaustive effort on his part and he obviously loves his job. He concludes that the present-day Maya are delighted to learn about their ancestors; argues that the Mayan civilization has been torn apart or destroyed repeatedly, most recently in the 1980s with Central America's civil wars. He interprets his work through the lens of a scholar and linguist, but not through meeting people and discovering what they want in the present in relation to their history. He does not write how the Mayans were “Christianized” and their native language stolen by the Spanish. This book didn't work because Coe focused too much on the academic aspect and less on the human