Dreamsnake

by Vonda N. McIntyre

In a far-future, post-holocaust Earth, a young healer named Snake travels the world, healing the sick and injured with her companion, the alien dreamsnake. But she is being pursued. . . .

Genres: Science Fiction, Fantasy, Fiction, Post Apocalyptic, Hugo Awards, Speculative Fiction, Audiobook

312 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published March 1, 1978

About the author

Vonda Neel McIntyre was a U.S. science fiction author. She was one of the first successful graduates of the Clarion Science fiction writers workshop. She attended the workshop in 1970. By 1973 she had won her first Nebula Award, for the novelette "Of Mist, and Grass and Sand." This later became part of the novel Dreamsnake, which won both the Hugo and Nebula Awards. The novelette and novel both concern a female healer in a desolate primitivized venue. McIntyre's debut novel was The Exile Waiting which was published in 1975. Her novel Dreamsnake won the Nebula Award and Hugo Award for best novel in 1978 and her novel The Moon and the Sun won the Nebula in 1997. She has also written a number of Star Trek and Star Wars novels, including Enterprise: The First Adventure and The Entropy Effect. She wrote the novelizations of the films Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, Star Trek III: The Search for Spock, and Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home.

Reviews

[carol. · Rating 2 out of 5]

I abandoned this at about page 183. Why? I fully admit much of it is me, in this particular mood in my life at this moment. But some of the responsibility needs to go to McIntyre for writing what 100% seems like Women's Sci-Fi, 1970s-Style. Call it the Female version of Dune. Not to mention the novel-length 'plot' feels a great deal a series of short stories strung together into a novel. It turns out that my feeling was not inaccurate; the book sprung out of an award-winning novellete.

What's Women's Sci-Fi, you ask? Oh, it's simple stuff; it's the stuff that's about being a female and owning (female) power. In the 1970s, it also includes sexual inequity, possibly insta-love with a man who struggles with women's equity, and quite probably about rape. It's always about being a biological and gendered girl in a structure that resembles the Quest of the (Male) Hero. If I sound dismissive, it's only because I grew up in heavily genderized sci-fi and it appears that I can't even revisit it for long. It reminded me a bit of Carol Nelson Douglas' Six of Swords series.

So the premise is that this woman, nicknamed 'Snake,' is a healer, who uses her specially bred snakes and healer training to basically create individually tailored vaccines and cures. It's pretty fucking brilliant for 1978, I have to say. Here we are, 2021 and CAR-T engineered cells are all the rage for curing cancer, which is essentially the same idea. At any rate, best I can guess, these 'dreamsnakes' actually come from alien/foreigners to the world who are holed up in a city that is controlled by a wealthy, hierarchical system. Shocking, I know.

This newly-minted healer is out, far past anywhere known to her, the post-apocalyptic wastelands, bringing vaccines and healing to the people trying to make a living on the edges of the world. Unfortunately, something not unsurprising happens to her dreamsnake, at almost the exact moment she forges a deep and lasting insta-love, and she's left somewhat bereft.

Traveling happens, followed by an interlude with a trio of traders, where we can see how a three-way relationship may work. Then travel and an interlude at a village where the headman has been bold enough to ban indentured servitude but is blind to its inequities in his own enclave. We probably learn something about how awful and unequitable male relationships can be in this section. Back at the farm, the insta-love has decided to set off in pursuit of his object. The best thing I can say about this is that he's portrayed in a very typically 'feminine' way, being very family-minded, relatively powerless and a caretaker spirit. Yay.

Then we set up the encounter with a 'madman.' I've no doubt I would learn some other thing about how generally male-female dynamics are abusive and sucky at this point, as the 'madman' uses the girl she rescued as an emotional lever.

What I've learned in my old age is that the most insidious chains are the ones we apply ourselves. I appreciate the consciousness-raising, of a sorts, and the idea that Snake is the hero in her own story. But the actual story-telling is too weak, and the plot points are too tired and familiar for me to want to stay in the world any longer, because it's not going anywhere I haven't already been.

[Sarah · Rating 5 out of 5]

While this book gets docked a point or two for the cheesy 70s cover and the title, it deserves a place among the classics of the genre. I first read the Nebula-winning novella "Of Mist, And Grass, And Sand," in middle school, but I never realized that McIntyre had expanded it to novel length. It's a thoughtful adventure, a quest led by a mature and confident heroine, Snake. I love her as a character: she knows who she is, she is good at what she does, and she is comfortable in her own skin. I also love that this book is not your typical post-apocalyptic nightmare. It takes place so long after a nuclear catastrophe that society has rebuilt itself, albeit in a very different form. This lets McIntyre present us with a familiar but somewhat alien landscape, advanced and regressive technology, humans acting human but according to slightly different societal rules, all with lots of room to explore. While there are a couple of elements that seem as dated as the cover, all in all I thought McIntyre did a beautiful job of expanding that original story into the larger tale told here.

[Allison Hurd · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was really pleasantly surprised by this! '70s scifi and I have a rather antagonistic relationship, so I was hoping to read the late great McIntyre, pay my respects, and retreat to safer grounds. But this was delightful! I mean, yes, it was still 70s-tastic, but in a fun way, not in a stabby way.

CONTENT WARNING (no actual spoilers, just a list of topics): animal cruelty, snakes (obvs), rape, pedophilia, child abuse, medical procedures, mental illness, a sort-of-questionably consensual sex scene, torture, able-ism, drug addiction, death of a loved one.

Things to love:

-Snake. The protagonist is awesome. I've always been a sucker for healer woman characters, and she's rad--empathic, strong, competent, kind but the real sort of kind, not "nice." I loved the mystic vibe, too, felt a bit like a grown up version of "Wise Child."

-The world. All your favorite fantasy vistas but with more tech! How can you not love the idea of bioengineered snakes that provide medications via their venom? I guess if you're afraid of snakes you wouldn't, but I love sneks and this was exactly the sort of thing I would have imagined as a kid. Best "animal companion" book I've read in awhile.

-Arevin. Hello, new book boyfriend. You are so tan and gentle and just broody enough.

-Melissa. Ugh, I got so lost in how cute Snake and Melissa are together, and their adorable little found family. This kid is great, a wonderful blend of seeming child-like, processing her life, and the growing bonds of mother-child love despite their lack of shared DNA. Really well done I thought.

-The feminist spins. Women in power! Women wanting and initiating sex! Women being steadfast and reasonable! Women being aggressive! Men who cry and show affection! Mothers who are still good at their jobs and keep working! Feminine horror handled responsibly and with empathy! Sure, a bit obvious in some parts but the women all felt human--flaws, good qualities, bad moments, heroics, all of it. It was really refreshing, especially given my initial expectations.

-The end. I'll admit, at first I wasn't sure what this story was. I enjoyed whatever was happening, but the plot wasn't super focused. But the end was classic action adventure, happy ending and all. I wanted to clap for the final line.

Things that took some effort:

-It's still 70s scifi. Polyamory/free love, weird "just don't worry about it" science, all of that is still here. None of these are a problem, but if you hate all tropes of 70s scifi, you won't escape them here, they're just done a little more cheekily. Yes, this includes some stereotypes of people that might be grating/harmful.

-It got heavy, man. There are a few parts that get dark. I think McIntyre did a good job keeping the darkness mostly honest, certainly better than many more current works I've read, but it's still there and tough and imperfect.

-Could have used a bit more explanation up front. There's one scene in particular that felt a bit rape-y and it's not until 30% further in we learn it wasn't, it was shyness and affection. A few other things, too, just sort of get dropped on you and either you never figure it out (like where this world is?) or you do, but so much later it's no longer relevant.

-Meanders a bit. Like I said, I enjoyed the things happening, but the plot sort of takes a vacation for about 80% of the book. It's there, so if you like "event" based books rather than "character" based books, it'll get there, but it's much more character-focused, I'd say.

I'm really impressed and glad to have listened to this (hat tip to the narrator, too, who did a great job with the voices). An excellent work of classic science fiction that manages to be engaging even today. I will definitely read more by this author.

[Mike Moore · Rating 2 out of 5]

Look, I read a lot of science fiction. Enough that I would mention it. So I have a pretty high tolerance for silliness. This book overwhelmed my tolerance and left me staggered by the sheer nonsense of it all.

Welcome to a post-apocalyptic future where isolated communities blunder about in moral turpitude waiting for an oddly naive young woman to come straighten them out with good sense and her trusty snakes. You see, snakes are used as drug dispensers in the future, and the woman (who's also named Snake) is a healer, so she carries around a cobra and a rattler for medicinal purposes. She's been entrusted by her teachers to walk the earth like that Caine dude. They trained her in medicine and herpetology, but somehow neglected to mention that other people might have odd customs like not respecting other people's property, drug addiction or killing snakes. Each of these come as a profound shock when she encounters them.

Anyway, off goes our intrepid heroine. She meets a series of people whose incredible obliviousness creates problems that she handily solves. The fact that the problems are sometimes horrible is pretty well negated by their ridiculousness. In one instance, I imagine the mayor of a town (who was shocked and outraged by Snake's discovery of a rape victim) saying to his trusted adviser after she leaves "Say, whose idea was it anyway to have a brutal and overbearing unmarried man become the guardian for a disfigured girl on the verge of puberty? In retrospect, that wasn't an obvious choice."

So okay, this is an empowerment fantasy and I can respect that, but it's so contrived that it becomes tedious. There are numerous loose ends and holes in the book, but the book doesn't suffer for them because it seems perfectly obvious how they would all play out. If anything, I'm glad the author didn't bother to explain more.

[Anthony · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a wonderfully patient, subtle, and intimate novel, unusually so in the SFF canon. My mother was a nurse, which led me to being especially drawn in with the healer Snake as she made her way through her travels.

Some of the pacing in the latter third was a little off, and there were aspects of the story of the major antagonist that didn’t quite make sense, but overall I’m very glad to have spent time with this multi-award-winning classic.

[Wanda Pedersen · Rating 4 out of 5]

The publisher says:

They called the healer Snake, and she bore the name proudly, for the medicine she distilled from the venom of the viper she carried with her was a potent cure; and the soothing power of her other companion, the alien dreamsnake, banished fear. But the primitive ignorance of those she served killed her dreamsnake and wrecked her career - for dreamsnakes were dreadfully rare, and Center would not grant her another. Snake's only hope was to find a new dreamsnake - and on her quest, she was pursued by two implacable followers, one driven by love, one by fear and need.

Me:

I enjoyed this short little tale of a healer trying to find her place in the world, making mistakes as we all do and struggling to find a way out of a bad situation. Finding companionship, love and an adopted daughter. A strong female main character, solving problems competently yet accepting help when it is offered. A book which passes the Bechdel test with flying colours [there is more than one female character and they talk to each other about something besides men].

My only complaint was that it was too short—there were several interesting items which tickled my curiosity and made me wish that there was a sequel or that the original was a bit thicker, with more detail. For example, how did Earth get to this post-apocalyptic state? Who are the aliens who created the domes and brought the strange plants and dreamsnakes to Earth? Have they stuck around or who exactly is in the intact city dome?

In a world where there are still so many books in which the female characters are stiff as cardboard or stereotypical caricatures , this book from the 1970s really shines as a book where I felt real affection for Snake. She is a realistic woman, with emotions and dilemmas that I can relate to. I must read more of McIntyre’s work.

[Bradley · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was worried that I might have thought this early SF dystopia might have not held up so well after nearly 40 years of a never ending stream of them, but considering that I recently watched some early Mad Max films, I'm all good. We have to place these things in their time.

After all, where else are you going to get a surprisingly deep character and women's study dystopian future that includes aliens, nearly Bene Gesserit healers, the depths of adoption and justice, and a woman who embodies the symbol of wisdom as Snake?

To be sure, the novel is mild in comparison with so many gritty Dystopians or even a grand portion of YAs, but it does have heart.

In analysis, I can give it higher props for being some of the very first SFs of the time to bring in some of the new growing trends of fantasy, being darker and unwilling to look away from cultural injustice or be willing to devolve into character caricature. Like I said, the characters are developed carefully and realistically.

The novel would never earn a Hugo these days, but we should never forget that those who start a trend that everyone later beats to death still began it. ;)

[Emma Deplores Goodreads Censorship · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed this book a lot. It’s the story of a traveling healer in a post-apocalyptic world, which the author classified as sci-fi but which feels to me more like fantasy. Though published in the 1970s, it mostly works quite well in the 2020s.

The story begins episodically, and to an extent continues that way: as a healer, Snake travels among small communities helping with their immediate needs. But early events ultimately set her on a bit of a quest, while a couple of the characters she meets become more lasting parts of her life. The pacing is gentle, and by fantasy standards, Snake’s stakes are not particularly high. But it works, because the secondary characters’ stakes are high and because Snake herself is so loveable. She’s emotionally mature, kind, and competent, none of which are common traits among fantasy heroines. I enjoy a good young, inexperienced heroine with social and emotional problems as well as the next reader (though overall I’d like fewer teens, please), but it’s a pleasure to have a break from that with a protagonist capable of handling herself and helping others, whether the challenge or situation is medical, diplomatic, physical, emotional or sexual. She’s a character worth reading about and so I was happy to follow her around as she tries to save people’s lives and augment the healers’ supply of painkilling snakes.

Other good stuff: the settings are vivid and show originality, and I liked that McIntyre doesn’t explain the world’s past and how it got from ours to theirs, which generally strikes me as a hallmark of insecure sci-fi, but just focuses on the story. While the characters aren’t extraordinarily complex, they have emotional depth that makes them easy to engage with, even those with limited page time. I was invested enough to be concerned for them, and the book delivers an emotionally satisfying conclusion. The writing is clean and suits the story well, never getting bogged down. The book reads as if McIntyre has some knowledge of medicine—by no means a given with authors writing “healer” protagonists—and although I assume the use of snakes to create medicine to be fantastical, it comes across as plausible within the context of the story and does have some real-world parallels in traditional medicine.

Mixed stuff: The book works as the standalone novel it is, but I agree with those who say it feels like it should be the first in a series; it ends a little sooner than it could have, with a lot left to do in the world (though, one might say, that’s life for you). I was also less engaged with the quest than with Snake’s stays in various locales, which meant my interest took a dip in the second half, though the climax and end brought it back.

Bad stuff: The villainous character appearing at the end is the book’s least convincing figure. Also, reissues tend to have a problem with lazy copyediting and that holds true here.

Thematic and setting stuff: This is an interesting one. In many ways, Dreamsnake feels up-to-date with today’s standards for social justice despite its 1978 publication date. Its women have agency, and in some ways it feels less self-conscious about gender issues than many books today—Snake isn’t focused on not needing a man to rescue her, for instance; she just gets on with it, while being mature enough to accept help where it’s offered. Homosexuality is portrayed as normal though not the orientation of any major character, and while race is a non-issue in the setting, the cast features diverse skin tones. Polyamory shows up in the world, and there’s a fair amount of variation as to what constitutes a family. Some of that seems over-idealistic to me—Snake and many others seem to have been raised collectively by a large number of healers, but turned out fine and see them all as one big family rather than the institution that I read them to be (children do need attachment figures after all!).

A couple of elements, though, do come across as hopelessly dated. The painkilling snakes are essentially living opiates, and a portion of the book feels heavily influenced by the fearmongering rhetoric of the early days of the drug war, of the “dealers will forcibly addict our children by tricking them into taking free drugs!” variety. All the adults in the book also seem to be working with the assumption that pre-teens can validly consent to sex with adults, including their own caretakers—fortunately it doesn’t get too gross since the child in question is clear about never wanting this, but given the propensity of abuse to weaken a person’s ability to know or express their own desires, that’s by no means a given. Similarly, there’s a scene involving adults that comes across as less than enthusiastic consent—though it’s unclear how much of that is about the author trying to hide the ball on the “magic words” that constitute a proposition in this culture (which in context, mostly don’t come across as one).

Overall though, I did enjoy this book a lot, despite a couple of elements that likely wouldn’t be present had it been written this year. Definitely worth a read for those who are interested, and I’m glad I read it despite my low opinion of The Moon and the Sun. While both are idealistic, by virtue of featuring a more mature character, this one feels like a far more mature book.

[DivaDiane SM · Rating 5 out of 5]

My second reading, this time as an audiobook. Strangely, I had little to no recollection of the plot after the first chapter, the original short story, and that only the main event. So it was like reading it for the first time again.

I love the intimate nature of the book and the glimpses of a post-apocalyptic world influenced by off-worlders and some high-tech. It was an interesting approach. The main plot, which was not always clear (lose a Dreamsnake, work to get a new one and figure out how to get more), took the Healer, Snake, on horseback from small, isolated community to small, isolated community. The way each community had developed was interesting and we are shown her (and others’) growth among strangers in a very compelling way.

I really enjoyed revisiting this book and have no doubt in another 15 years I’ll be able to experience it anew again!

[Wastrel · Rating 4 out of 5]

A very odd book by modern standards, but one that is strikingly of its era. Manages to do some things very badly (dialogue, most of the characterisation (the central character is solid and likeable but a Mary Sue and not all that distinctive, while the supporting cast are mostly two(or fewer)-dimensional and also somewhat MSish), a lot of the plot details), yet do others very well (descriptive prose; setting and its exploration, some of the emotional stuff).

Sort of like a less-good Ursula Le Guin novel, really. Slow, meandering social science fiction.

Probably not selling it well. It is really interesting in its setting, and in the way it gradually reveals the nature of the setting, and also in its overarching plot (it doesn't have much of one, so what it does have is very free, and hence surprising). Special mention should be made of the idea of a society that is in some ways more backward than ours, but in other ways more developed - normally, primitive or post-apocalyptic societies are just that, but McIntyre takes the more interesting and probably more realistic approach that some skills and technologies are able to survive even a general deterioriation in economic conditions, and maybe even may continue to progress.

I think in the end I probably came away valuing it more as an interesting demonstration of what can be done in SF than as a novel in its own right, which I guess is both a compliment and a criticism.

My fuller review as usual is over here on my blog

[Alex Bright · Rating 4 out of 5]

4 stars

I was drawn in immediately to McIntyre's muted, intimate portrayal of characters inhabiting a far flung, post-apocalyptic world. The story is of Snake, a healer who has lost one of her prized serpents which she uses to help people, and her journey to continue to help anyone she can. McIntyre's compassion for her characters is evidently mirrored in Snake, Arevin, Melissa, and the world she has created -- even if the world and its inhabitants are far from perfect. I found myself truly caring for many characters within pages of their respective introductions.

What strikes me most about this world is how strangely progressive it is in a lot of ways, particularly with regard to sexual education and relationships, but has created new ways in which to torment those who don't fit the mold. McIntyre may be an optimist, but she also has a finger on the negative impulses of humanity. Honestly, I was kind of surprised at the publishing date of 1978 -- it's not dated in the slightest.

Though I enjoyed the characters and story very much, I was a bit unsatisfied with some of the elements -- particularly the lost plot threads of aliens and the underground city. I would have loved to explore both in much more depth, but I suppose they weren't terribly important to the central narrative. There were also a few parts which dragged, but nothing which took away from my overall pleasure of existing in McIntyre's world for a few days. Too bad there isn't a sequel!

[YouKneeK · Rating 4 out of 5]

Dreamsnake is a standalone novel set in Earth’s distant future, at some point after a nuclear war, featuring a young woman named Snake. Snake is a healer, and healers use snakes to heal illnesses such as tumors and infections. The titular Dreamsnake is a special and rare snake used to help a patient have pleasant dreams or, if there’s nothing that can be done to save that patient, to help them die without pain.

I have a few complaints, but this was an interesting and fast read. I enjoyed the characters and I enjoyed the story. I particularly liked Melissa. I liked Snake too, with the brief exception of one very squicky thing she said to a 12-year-old girl, which I guess was supposed to fit within the cultural setting, but that setting wasn’t developed anywhere near well enough for me to accept her suggestion as appropriate even in the context of the fictional setting.

That leads to one of my other complaints -- the world-building. The setting was really interesting and hinted at all sorts of cool elements, but I was left wanting more. I wanted to know more of the world’s history, and especially more about the city and the offworlders who visited it, and the source of the alien creatures and plants. I couldn’t tell if the author had a detailed backstory in mind as she wrote the novel and just didn’t want to risk too much exposition, or if she just tossed in random elements she thought sounded appealing and that would help drive her plot where she wanted it to go.

On the complaint side, I also could have really done without the whole side plot in which a shared snake wrestling event leads to the kind of instalove that could drive a man to travel across a desert and beyond, in search of a girl he’d known for like a day or two. That whole thing was just ridiculous to me, and the story would have worked better without it.

I’m probably making this book sound really bad, because like I’ve said before it’s a lot easier for me to explain the things I dislike than it is to explain the things I liked, but I really did enjoy it a lot. The instalove side plot was only a small portion of the story, and the world-building helped add interest to the story even though I was left a little unsatisfied due to its lack of depth. The main thing is that I stayed interested in the story throughout and was satisfied with how it was wrapped up.

[Oleksandr Zholud · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a SF post-apoc (?) novel, which reads at times like fantasy. It won Nebula, Locus and Hugo Award in 1979. I read as a Buddy read November 2019 in SciFi and Fantasy Book Club group.

This is a classic SF adventure/quest across the world, unknown to the reader with hints misunderstood by the narrator, which ought to end-up with finding the Grail. The protagonist is a woman-healer called Snake. She wonders across the world helping people with her three serpents: an albino cobra Mist, a rattlesnake Sand and extraterrestrial Dreamsnake that works as opiate/ether. This is maybe the early example of biopunk, but without prominent punkish elements: the serpents a bio-engineered to produce a broad range of serums and antibodies.

The first chapter of the book is actually a Nebula-winning novelette by the author, entitled "Of Mist, And Grass, And Sand," and is considerably denser than the rest of the story. Some elements of the story are ‘pure’ 70s with free sex (even with minors), feminism (a lot of persons in power are women), drugs… the quest maybe a bit simplistic by today’s standards but there is a beauty in this, esp. if the reader knows a lot of 60-70s SF.

[Lost Planet Airman · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is REALLY good science fiction, without a laser beam or spaceship in sight. (There are a few spaceships out of sight.

Snake is a Healer, her name rarely given and apparently carrying much unseen gravitas for her people. On a future Earth she travels and uses alien and genetically modified snakes among her tools to dispense advanced medicine.

Snake's awesome; it's a much better world she lives in but there's still problems to be solved, for civilization and individuals. The feminist message was good, although occasionally delivered a bit heavy-handed (but I think it would have been difficult to to fit it into the plot without sacrificing either strength or subtlety.) Definitely glad SFFBC brought us this one! Hugo, Nebula, Locus winner for 1979.

My 250th book of the SF&F Book Club shelf!!!

[Jeraviz · Rating 3 out of 5]

Vonda N. McIntyre escribe un libro bastante extraño, ambientado en una sociedad post-apocalíptica donde las ciudades se encuentran bajo cúpulas y el resto es desierto, donde hay unos "curadores" que gracias al veneno de serpientes curan enfermedades, y donde hay por ahí unos alienígenas que ni se explican ni aparecen.

Acompañamos a la protagonista en su búsqueda de una de esas serpientes para poder curar y en ese camino descubrimos una sociedad feminista e igualitaria en las relaciones sexuales, sin prejuicios ni estereotipos. Los primeros capítulos donde vemos esa ambientación a lo Mad Max y esa sociedad han hecho que continuara leyendo hasta el final, a pesar de que poco a poco la trama se fuera revelando bastante descafeinada y sin fuerza.

Como llevaba una racha mala de clásicos multipremiados, el haberme encontrado algo bien escrito y con un worldbuilding atractivo hace que no le ponga muy mala nota, pero no me atrevería a recomendarlo.

Y por supuesto, si tienes fobia a las serpientes, ni te acerques a este libro.

[Silvana · Rating 4 out of 5]

Glad I finally read this. Thanks Allison for her guiding questions in the SFFBC group read there since I tend to forget book contents right after I read it.

Here's my hopefully non spoilery responses:

I loved the world the most. It's a type of post apocalyptic one that I've never encountered, quite alien but also still retain most of the Earthy parts. I loved the technology, biotech, genetic engineering, everytime the book talks about tech my ears just pricked up.

As for the relationship among characters, it actually contained a pairing that I very rarely read in SFF so it definitely whet my appetite for more. Plus, of course the relationship between Snake and her uh, snakes. I know I said I got reminded of Britney Spears' I'm A Slave for You music video, but nothing like that in here LOL

The plot was pretty straightforward and I appreciated the no-nonsense, compact storytelling too. Oftentimes authors got lost in their POVs minds and/or overexplaining the world - here I did not get any of that.

Some parts of the book did not work for me, though. There are some content warnings including child abuse that's pretty triggery and one romance was just underdeveloped. However, they did not stop me from awarding this very unique, well-written book four stars. And yes, it deserves the triple win (Hugo, Nebula, Locus). The afterword was wonderful too, when the author told how she came to this story.

[RJ - Slayer of Trolls · Rating 3 out of 5]

McIntyre expanded her own 1973 Nebula and Locus Award-winning novelette Of Mist, And Grass, And Sand into this 1978 full-length novel that swept the major genre awards (Hugo, Nebula and Locus). Published in the heart of the Disco Era, the post-apocalyptic science-fantasy story contains some of the Free Love hallmarks of the day, but has amazingly progressive trappings for its time - not only is there a strong but doubt-ridden, independent, non-violent female protagonist but you will also see non-traditional relationships constructed of varying numbers and genders of participants who are referred to as "partners" (one minor character "Meredith" is never identified by gender, 36 years before John Scalzi sprained his arm patting himself on the back for doing the same thing in Lock In), sensitive males in non-traditional roles (such as child-tending) who aren't afraid to cry or show emotions, and no real protagonist although there are a couple "bad" people who must be overcome. The world is very interesting and seems to have been set up well for a series that never happened, but unfortunately the story meanders at times and introduces a lot of elements that never really go anywhere, the character arc is weak, and the romance is not developed well and feels forced - it's still well worth reading but ultimately feels as though it could have been much better.

[Mareike · Rating 4 out of 5]

A 3,5 roundedup to a four.

I liked a lot of things about this book, especially the worldbuilding and the different groups of people Snake encounters. I especially liked the sense of equality and respect running through (most of) those encounters. It feels like that is rare in novels with a post-apocalyptic setting.
But while I felt for some of the characters, the book never touched or moved me deeply, so it never reached the point that made me love this book unconditionally.

[Andreas · Rating 4 out of 5]

Dreamsnake is the extension of the award winning novelette Of Mist, And Grass, And Sand and is set at the same time and planet Earth as The Exile Waiting.

It reads like a fantasy story like Tehanu for the first 50 pages before it becomes clear that it is a post-nuclear SF setting.
It follows a young, female healer called "Snake" within her probationary year. The eponymous Dreamsnakes are one of three kinds of snakes that healers in this setting use. They are irreplacable, because they rarely reproduce, can't be cloned and a loss is therefore devastating for healers. Now, Snake lost her dreamsnake, and this novel is about the quest to find replacement.

On her quest, she falls in love, adopts a child, goes through lots of harshness. She is presented in general as a strong woman, who commits errors but also learns from them. It is very easy to identify with her.
Writing is often very emotional, it uses more descriptive than action-oriented scenes, is more on the quiet side.

I found a very good interview at io9. McIntyre talks about how she came to the story (a Clarion workshop word draw), her reaction about Arevin's (non-)masculinity, the publishing situation in the 70s, the out-of-print problem of older book (and bookviewcafe's answer to it). She also talks about one of the side-character's (Merideth) gender - you might have noticed, that his/her sex isn't revealed at all through pronouns etc.

The interview deepened my impression that there are lots of interesting ideas pressed into this slim book. Emotions, characterization, and setting are absolutely worthwhile your reading time, and it deserved the triple Hugo/Nebula/Locus awards.

[Kaa · Rating 3 out of 5]

I thought the first chapter, which was originally an independent short story, was really lovely and moving. I enjoyed the world-building of the whole book a lot, especially the open attitudes toward sexuality and the use of snakes for medicine, and I thought the way the story slowly opened up to reveal more and more about the setting was wonderfully done. However, I was a bit let down by where the story went in the second half, and I found the fact that a main antagonist was a person with disabilities who hadn't been able to be cured by the healers to be pretty jarring.

[Dawn F · Rating 5 out of 5]

Vonda N. McIntyre’s Star Trek novel The Entropy Effect has been one of my favorite novels since I was a teenager. I’ve read it twice and have wanted to read it again for a long time. I was luckily enough to have a conversation with her about it, Star Trek and writing in general on Twitter, just a couple of months before she passed away.

I also promised her I’d read other of her work and well, ms. McIntyre, I finally did, and I loved it.

She writes stories in a way that’s rare today, where the surface plot is really a conduit for personal growth and understanding. I can really only compare her to Ursula Le Guin. This story of Snake, Melissa, and the other characters, is as much a literal, physical cross country journey as it is an inner journey. She understands human behavior and motivations so well and handles really heavy subjects very delicately but without shying away or attaching shame to it. Snake is an adult who respects and listens to a child as another equal human being, here are characters who make mistakes and learn, we even have queerness handled with ease and a normalsy that continues to amaze me existed so freely decades ago in speculative fiction, especially science fiction written by women. It’s even subtly present in her Star Trek novel, which is really all about Spock trying to change history to save Kirk’s life. I mean, fan fiction much?

And the ending. Oh, so cheeky. Well done. I’m only sad I won’t be able to let her know I finally did read more of her work but if she’s watching somewhere, here’s to you and to further exploring your work.

[Michael Finocchiaro · Rating 4 out of 5]

Vonda McIntyre takes us on a crazy apocalyptic journey with Snake and her snakes. I loved the many ideas put forward in the book as well as how she developed the characters and brought the two narrative threads together. Fantastic sci-fi/fantasy novel!

[Nate · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a fucking weird book.
It must have won the Hugo and nebula awards based on the concept alone because that was the best part.

In a post nuclear holocaust earth, this healer called Snake, uses genetically modified snakes for different types of medical treatments.
When she ventures out into the wasteland to bring her healing talents to primitive tribal people, they kill her possibly irreplaceable “dream snake” out of fear and superstition.

Without her dream snake she’s unable to be an effective healer. Snake is now faced with the prospect of going home to face the consequences of the loss of the rare and valuable creature.

The world she creates is really interesting, full of wealth and technological disparity.
There’s also some barley touched on elements like a mysterious walled city that won’t admit outsiders and
may have contact with “off-worlders.”

I expected this to be an epic quest for Snake to replace her …snake, but it had a strange plot that feels like a fix up novel or a movie edited together from several episodes of a tv show.
This also had the typical “love at first sight” side plot that was a bit groan producing.

The male characters are all either predatory or submissive and I won’t chide her for that considering how most female characters get portrayed in older books but (spoiler) there’s a part where Snake is trying to rescue a young girl from her abusive caretaker, while at the same time manipulating an insecure teenage boy into a sexual relationship. I’m not sure if she was trying to make some kind of statement, juxtaposing those relationships or was just horny for high school boys, but I was scratching my head a bit.

So, I don’t know. Maybe it was just the 70s but this book should have been an epic quest and it really went off into the weeds. It was definitely interesting and had great world building, I just think it didn’t fulfill its potential.

[Ian Banks · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is dated in a way that most books around forty years old are dated but the setting and ideas are presented competently enough that it doesn’t really matter. It’s about a healer, Snake, who travels with three gengineered snakes that help her practice medicine. One of them is killed and she must find a replacement for it. It sounds like a standard quest story and in a lot of ways it is, but what makes it stand out is the easy prose that lulls the reader into thinking they are getting something conventional until they realise that they aren’t. It’s unusual in that it presents a post-apocalyptic society that has achieved a measure of gender parity that was unheard of even in the time it was written. Snake travels through a landscape that threatens her, not as a woman, but as a human being. She is respected and listened to for her achievements and earned status rather than for an accident of birth. But none of this is presented as a major point in the novel: it is an incidental detail in a world in which sexuality is treated as matter-of-factly as any other aspect of life. And in a novel that has so much else going for it - great writing, interesting characters, a world that feels real, a plot that builds up a steady head of steam - some plain old progressiveness feels like the icing on a delicious cake.

[HeyT · Rating 4 out of 5]

After first reading about this book on one of those Tor.com blog posts about women sci-fi writers I put it on my tbr pile and then kept getting side tracked. I finally sat down and read it due to a buddy read for one of my goodreads groups and it was just as good as the article said it would be. I was immediately immersed in the world from the first chapter and kept on being entranced in the world as it moved on from the initial short story and into the rest of the book. I like that Snake is determined to accomplish her goals despite adversity and has the capability to acknowledge her shortcomings in an effort to do good in the world around her.

[Ruxandra Grrr [in a slump :(((((] · Rating 5 out of 5]

Another total banger from an author featured in Khatru, I loved almost every minute of this, and ground my teeth through the very difficult to read parts. This book felt specifically written for me and my tastes and what I'm looking for and I'm super happy that Vonda McIntiyre has a bunch of other books for me to sink my teeth into.

Like, I cannot stress enough how this LITERALLY helped steady my heart rhythms a few times throughout the week, because it was so enjoyable, thanks to the interesting world and the super duper lovely main character, Snake. The closest book in vibe I can think of as a comp is Tehanu, and not only in vibe, as they both feature a lovely adoptive mother-daughter relationship where the daughter has been through A LOT (content warning for CSA :( like, I hope nobody gets upset about a spoiler, I thought it was important to mention).

Snake is a very emotionally aware and caring healer and woman suffering from a chronic illness. And a fucking great main character who travels through this post-apocalyptic world vaccinating people and using genetically modified snakes for healing. Indiana Jones should not read this book, lol, because there's snakes aplenty. It was so refreshing to be in her (close third person) perspective, because of her empathy and understanding of the complexity of human nature and her inability to be chill in the face of injustice.

And the world was just so interesting, socially. I don't necessarily want to give away too much, but it is a world where some people have polyamorous families and where everyone is super chill about sex, casual or not (because when they're young, most of them receive sex education and also knowledge on how to block conception), straight or not. It truly was so soothing to read such a world that is, once again, postapocalyptic, with radioactive craters from nuclear bombs, but most people choose to be nice with each other.

Worth mentioning that the male love interest is kind of put in the tropey spots that usually women were put in in SFF, but he still feels like a well-rounded character, even if he cries when he tells Snake he will wait for her (which is adorable). Also, it's funny how McIntyre sets up his part of the story for us, kind of fooling us into thinking he will arrive just in time to save her - I didn't buy it, he wasn't able to fight even one or two guards in Mountainside -, but Snake gets out of the dome on her own strength and only then does he help a little by boiling water and keeping watch over Snake & Melissa. It was so fun.

Yeah, I could go on and on, but I don't want to spoil too much of it, really, it's worthy of discovery.

[Andreea Daia · Rating 5 out of 5]

Quick and dirty reading notes and (i)relevant thoughts
(I read this novel a while ago, but I decided to go back and write a review, since is so little known. And what a pity that is. )

✐ This is a very different kind of science-fiction and I read that the author had trouble finding a publisher since most folks took it for fantasy. In fact Dreamsnake reads like a classic western, and it's only the brief details (mentions of genetic engineering, craters of atomic bombs, collapsed domes of alien spacecrafts, etc) that set this novel in a extremely-far post-apocalyptic future.

✐ The society presented ranges from the archaic tribal communities to a segregated super-developed city (the Center). In between these, there are the healers, leaving outside the Center but versed in genetic engineering. Over the last hundred of years, they altered the snakes such that, under catalytic drugs, the composition of their venom changes into useful drugs. Without the snakes, the healers are crippled and can do little for the sick. It is because of this that when the main character loses a very rare specimen, she finds herself at an impasse: return home in disgrace, or try to convince the Center to give her a new one.

✐ I read some reviews complaining that the novel has some scientifically obsolete facts. I disagree: the pure scientific details are so scarce, that I can hardly see how this book can ever become antiquated. I know little about DNA modification, but everything that is described in Dreamsnake seemed at least possible. Definitely much more scientifically attainable than the inescapable but 100% unfeasible faster-than-light travel that abounds in nearly every space-opera. Yet no one complains about FTL travel, even if the only possible way to accomplish it is to induce the space-time continuum itself to move faster than light and ride its wave, so to speak. Or no one complains when very recent novels mention having targets in the effective range of a laser ツ, or (my personal favorite) hitting a camouflaged target with a laser ツ ツ.

✐ But I digress. What I liked most about this book was that it has overall an upbeat vibe. In fact unlike most novels which start from a relative high point and progress toward a low one, Dreamsnake begins at the nadir and advances toward apex.

[Nicky · Rating 4 out of 5]

Received to review via Netgalley

It’s been quite a while since I read this, and I remembered it fondly enough, so when it came up on Netgalley, I decided to request it and do a reread. I only gave it three stars the first time, which surprised me when I looked it up and saw the raft of awards it got: Nebula, Hugo, Tiptree nomination, National Book Award finalist… I remembered it being quite like The Steerswoman in the narrative style, in the capable heroine; I remembered that the background of the story including queer and polyamorous characters in a casual, natural way — as well as plenty of capable women who knew what they were doing, who talked to each other (about things other than men!), who worked together.

Happily, all of that is still there, especially Snake’s care for others: for Melissa, and also for Gabriel, for Arevin, for the people she treats as a healer. Even for her snakes, though that’s not so surprising given that her livelihood relies upon them. And there are some quite lovely tender moments between Snake and the people she helps and becomes friends with.

The background of the story is fascinating too, and I don’t seem to have thought much about it before. It’s basically Earth, post-apocalypse, but exactly what that apocalypse was and how the aliens might have been involved, or even how long ago it was, are all shrouded and mysterious. And that background just lies behind the story, mostly not even used except in little bits — like the solution to breeding dreamsnakes. And there’s the whole issue of the healers using snake venom, how and why they would have begun that, how it all works. There’s room for half a dozen other stories here, though the one we’re told is a fairly straightforward redemption/quest story.

It’s still not quite a five star read for me: there’s something rather detached about it, emotionally, despite the tender moments. Sometimes the background feels a little too much like painted scenery. But for the most part, it was enjoyable to revisit Dreamsnake, and worth the time.

[Derek · Rating 4 out of 5]

Having just finished the hugly disappointing The Vor Game in my quest to read all the Hugo winners, this was a welcome breath of fresh air.

It was controversial in its day (but probably not so much now), with its polyandrous and polygynous (why does my computer's dictionary accept the former, but not the latter?) family relationships, people who have sex for fun, and a female lead who enjoys male companionship but doesn't need it.

Apparently, it rubbed some readers the wrong way that in a quest story set in a post-apocalyptic—and sometimes still radioactive—world, our "Mad Max" character is not only not a fighter but a healer. Personally, I loved the fact that while she carries a belt knife, it never even occurs to her to use it against an attacker.

McIntyre is, by background, a biologist, so even though her method of using snakes to cure disease was pure fantasy at the time, it was grounded in solid science. Unlike so much older SF, what was then fantasy only seems more plausible now, not less. 

[La gata lectora · Rating 3 out of 5]

Serpiente es una curadora en un mundo que sobrevivió a una guerra nuclear. Los humanos viven en ciudades cerradas o en tribus en el desierto negro. Ella creció con otros curadores y obtuvo sus tres serpientes para ejercer su profesión.

Ahora viaja por el desierto para atender a personas que necesitan atención médica o para poner vacunas. En una de las tribus muere su serpiente del sueño, la más difícil de conseguir porque no logran apenas clonarlas ni reproducirlas en cautividad.

A partir de ahí Serpiente emprenderá un viaje para conseguir una serpiente del sueño en el que irá tratando con distintas personas en lugares diferentes hasta llegar al misterio de las serpientes del sueño.

Este libro no es el típico libro de ciencia ficción en el que tenemos grandes héroes, un world building currado, acción y batallas… Tenemos a una mujer protagonista y temas como la relaciones humanas, el consentimiento en las relaciones sexuales, las formas de vivir la sexualidad, la sensibilidad, la maternidad, el amor, la amistad, las adicciones, el diálogo y el perdón… todo desde una perspectiva feminista.

Y es que la autora era fan nada más y nada menos que de Ursula K Leguin. Ganó los premios Hugo, Nebula y Locus con esta novela.

A favor: no es la típica machirulada y se tocan temas importantes.
En contra: para mi gusto le falta acción, algunas partes se me hicieron aburridas aunque los últimos capítulos remonta y me sorprendió para bien parte del misterio de las serpientes del sueño.

Me ha gustado, más cuando la he dejado reposar que mientras la leía. Pero tampoco me ha encantado, creo que le faltan elementos que la haga más atractiva y genere interés en el proceso. Una serie basada en esta novela sería genial, porque la protagonista es un personaje con mucho potencial.