In a future Earth covered in deserts and baked by a relentless sun, a healer moves across the land, from settlement to settlement, plying her trade and doing what she can to bring some measure of peace to the world's miserable inhabitants. Though the healer has her own knowledge gained from study in her mountain home, her dreamsnake, an alien creature whose bite delivers an intoxicating venom, aids her in her efforts and otherwise provides companionship to Snake in her long, lonely journeys.
Throughout her journey, we encounter the various societies that have sprung up in this hard land, from feudal towns, to egalitarian tribes, to technocratic enclaves where knowledge is jealously guarded. And so, while the story revolves around Snake's odyssey to replace the dreamsnake she has lost and the revelations that unfold as a result of her quest, the state of the world, its inhabitants and their societies, are the true stars of the show. Ms. McIntyre has created a vivid world whose sufferers are tested daily by an unforgiving sun and a radioactive landscape. Their beliefs and eccentricities propel the story to a rewardingly organic conclusion. Ms. McIntyre's superior skills never once let us down here as she makes believable a tortured land and its challenged people. (3/5 Stars)
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