The Gaia Websters

From Barnes & Noble

A science fiction novel set in the American Southwest after industrialized civilization has imploded on itself. Antieau is one of my favourite writers and novels like this are why: earthy and mysterious, tech-bright and glittering with ideas, but most importantly, written with great heart.
—Charles de Lint

VOYA - Margaret Miles

Since she woke in a desert cave ten years ago, remembering neither her name nor her past, the woman now calling herself Gloria Stone has served as healer to a post-techno-apocalypse Arizona Territory village. Despite others' opinions to the contrary, she has not believed that her ability to heal means that she is one of the legendary soothsayers; she enjoys her simple life, revering the power of the Earth and taking lovers such as the mysterious Benjamin (is he really a were-coyote?). But trouble is coming. The territory's governor, who seems to be too closely connected to proscribed technology, seems to be trying to acquire her services; his sinister emissary, Primer, has powers over her; and a seemingly incurable disease is attaching too many of the people she cares about. Only after a twist in the crisis puts Gloria back in touch with all her own memories does she learn that she is in fact a soothsayer-and she and the rest of the soothsayers are in fact information-processing androids who were tools of the unscrupulous entrepreneurs who caused the revolt against technology. Having learned that she embodies the things she most loathes, can Gloria find ways to strengthen society instead of destroy it? Antieau wraps a science fiction short story-the chapter in which Gloria remembers her past-in a post-apocalyptic novel of feminist, pro-Earth, antitechnology ethics. The moods of these two contrasting segments are so different that many readers will relish one while disliking the other. Those who really enjoy philosophical fiction are likely to consider this a utopian novel interrupted by the android chapter; readers who prefer a technological component in science fiction will find Gloria's world a distinct dystopia, enlivened only by the one chapter that explains its origins. While both perspectives will agree that Antieau brings up some interesting ideas here, neither is likely to find the novel more than mildly satisfying. VOYA Codes: 3Q 2P S (Readable without serious defects, For the YA with a special interest in the subject, Senior High-defined as grades 10 to 12).

Library Journal

In this eco-feminist fantasy from Antieau (The Jigsaw Woman, ROC: NAL, 1996), post-apocalyptic society's territories outlaw technology and live in harmony with the Earth. Gloria Stone practices the healing arts with herbs and laying on of hands in Arizona Territory's Coyote Creek. She has no memories beyond ten years ago. Then a mysterious epidemic sweeps through the community, and finding its cause leads Gloria to the truth about her past. Redolent with the sounds and scents of the desert and with a satisfying sense of Gloria's self-discovery; highly recommended.