Subject: THE GAIA WEBSTERS by Kim Antieau

From: "Michael I. Lichter" <[email-masked]>
Date: 01 Jun 1998 17:09:22 -0400

THE GAIA WEBSTERS by Kim Antieau
           ROC, June 1997, ISBN 0-451-45511-8, 230pp, US$12.95
                        Review by Michael Lichter

One of the most common Science Fiction protagonists is the boy or, less
often, girl who must hide special powers to avoid persecution. I'm not
sure if A.E. Van Vogt's "Slan" -- psychic post-humans with superhuman
intellect, commonly killed or maimed by normal humans -- were the
prototypes for this brand of hero, but they surely are one of the classic
examples. The origins of the hero's powers are often shrouded in mystery,
but you can be sure that both those powers and their secret will be
central to the story's resolution.

Kim Antieau's superhuman protagonist is a post-apocalyptic amnesiac healer
and bisexual "do me" eco-feminist who calls herself Gloria Stone. Gloria
heals bodies and peers into minds with a mere touch. Others like her are
known as "soothsayers" and have been hunted down and killed either for
their alleged role in the fall of civilization (300 years in the past) or
because of their supposed use of witchcraft. Gloria has been careful,
living a quiet life in the Arizona Territory town of Coyote Creek, but the
governor has noticed her and is willing to take extreme measures to get
his hands on her. When a strange disease threatens to take the lives of
people Gloria loves, and when an accident leaves her homeless, Gloria must
solve the riddle of her forgotten past or risk losing everything.

Setting aside Gloria's vaguely Native American "spirituality," she's a
female protagonist who Robert A. Heinlein would have loved. She struts
around naked, or nearly so, she's free with her affections, and she always
has multiple orgasms. She's strong, spunky, wry, and loving. Her best
friends are Cosmo, a coyote, and Benjamin, her coyote-ish sometime
squeeze.  Even though Antieau's first person narrative initially sounds
amateurish, it is hard not to identify with or at least like Gloria and
care about her life and loves. Though the book is, like most SF,
plot-driven, its pleasures lie mainly in Gloria's often humorous
interactions with her friends, patients, and the two little girls she
comes to adopt. Its other strength is in the vivid and powerful desert
landscape in which the story transpires.

The book's title is partly a pun -- Gloria loves playing around with the
etymologies of words, and comments that she probably read a dictionary
cover to cover in her youth. But *that* Webster is not the primary
referent of "webster," which also means "weaver." The Gaia Websters are
"weavers of the living earth" (my phrase, not hers). What does that mean?
We do not learn who or what the Gaia Websters are until the book's final
pages, nor do we ever fully learn what their role is. If they were healers
like Gloria, perhaps their destiny would be to heal the earth, but is that
the same thing as weaving? It's not clear whether Antieau is laying the
groundwork for a sequel or series, or whether she just isn't sure what the
Websters can and should do.

Setting plot aside, THE GAIA WEBSTERS is to the U.S. Southwest what Ernest
Callenbach's ECOTOPIA was to the Pacific Northwest; a picture of an
idyllic (though not perfect) society that lives in harmony with the earth,
rejects wasteful and unnecessary technology, and promotes a communitarian
ethic. At the same time, Anteiau points out some of the limitations of
this lifestyle; it requires the population regulation that results in the
reincarnation of the Border Patrol, and it promotes the insular
narrowmindedness that is the flipside of small town hominess. The result
is a simultaneous rejection of and embrace of technology, rejection and
embrace of communitarian values which is more confusing than enlightening.

I picked up THE GAIA WEBSTERS in hopes of finding a brief diversion, and
that is something it delivers. It may not inspire deep thought, but it is
a quick, enjoyable read. Check it out.

	%A	Kim Antieau
	%T	The Gaia Websters
	%I	ROC
	%C	New York
	%D	June 1997
	%G	ISBN 0-451-45511-8
	%P	230pp.
	%O	trade paperback, US$12.95