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The Wanderground: Stories of the Hill Women
The Wanderground is a speculative fiction novel by Sally Miller Gearhart, published in 1978 by Persephone Press. It is Gearhart's first and most famous novel, and continues to be used in women's studies classes as a characteristic example of the separatist feminism movement from the 1970s.
The Wanderground is a collection of short, interlocking narratives that build on each other to form a full novel. Chapters fit together loosely, often focusing on completely different characters in each chapter, or taking place in a different part of the world Gearhart created, although many characters make reappearances throughout the collection, as the stories begin to build on each other. Many of the chapters were first published as short stories, in fanzines, magazines, and lesbian periodicals including Ms., The Witch and the Chameleon, Quest: A Feminist Quarterly, and WomanSpirit.
The Wanderground is set in the United States, in the future, although no date is given. The stories focus on the hill women, a group of women who have fled from the men-ruled cities to the wilderness, where they live in all-women communities in harmony with each other and the natural world. The hill women have psychic powers that they use to communicate with each other and with animals, and to move through the world. The main narrative that weaves throughout almost all of the stories, is caused by some kind of shift in the cosmic balance between the hill women and the cities. Rumors are whispered, things are getting worse for women in the cities. As the stories build on each other, subtle remarks are made about how things are getting worse, the cities are becoming even more controlling, it is more dangerous for the women underground, men are appearing outside of the cities, even to the point of rapes occurring in the borderlands. Something is changing. The tension finally comes to the foreground when the gentles (gay men, who have the greatest respect for all women, especially the hill women) request a meeting with the hill women. The message is smuggled out of the city, and a great discussion begins. Even though the gentles are considered to be allies of the hill women, they are still men, and this mixed status of ally and enemy causes a great debate.
The Wanderground is a collection of short, interlocking narratives that build on each other to form a full novel. Chapters fit together loosely, often focusing on completely different characters in each chapter, or taking place in a different part of the world Gearhart created, although many characters make reappearances throughout the collection, as the stories begin to build on each other. Many of the chapters were first published as short stories, in fanzines, magazines, and lesbian periodicals including Ms., The Witch and the Chameleon, Quest: A Feminist Quarterly, and WomanSpirit.
The Wanderground is set in the United States, in the future, although no date is given. The stories focus on the hill women, a group of women who have fled from the men-ruled cities to the wilderness, where they live in all-women communities in harmony with each other and the natural world. The hill women have psychic powers that they use to communicate with each other and with animals, and to move through the world. The main narrative that weaves throughout almost all of the stories, is caused by some kind of shift in the cosmic balance between the hill women and the cities. Rumors are whispered, things are getting worse for women in the cities. As the stories build on each other, subtle remarks are made about how things are getting worse, the cities are becoming even more controlling, it is more dangerous for the women underground, men are appearing outside of the cities, even to the point of rapes occurring in the borderlands. Something is changing. The tension finally comes to the foreground when the gentles (gay men, who have the greatest respect for all women, especially the hill women) request a meeting with the hill women. The message is smuggled out of the city, and a great discussion begins. Even though the gentles are considered to be allies of the hill women, they are still men, and this mixed status of ally and enemy causes a great debate.
212 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published January 1, 1978
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1359 people want to read
About the author
Sally Miller Gearhart
9 books24 followersSally Miller Gearhart was an American teacher, feminist, science fiction writer, and political activist. In 1973 she became the first open lesbian to obtain a tenure-track faculty position when she was hired by San Francisco State University, where she helped establish one of the first women and gender study programs in the country. She later became a nationally known gay rights activist.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 42 reviews
January 26, 2010
"There are no words more obscene than 'I can't live without you.' Count them the deepest affront to the person." This idea is presented in the opening chapter of Sally Miller Gearhart's The Wanderground and, based on this, among other elements of that first chapter, I thought I might like this book. This does turn out to be an important idea in the book, but ultimately I could not get into The Wanderground. There are a couple of reasons for this.
The first is that The Wanderground, well, it kind of wanders. It does have a narrative, but it lacks a narrative drive or structure to help propel the reader through the text. In the end, there are only two reasons to keep reading the book: 1) enjoyment of the New Age-y spiritual tone of the book (I did not enjoy this), or 2) the (as it turns out, vain) hope that the source of the hill women's psychic powers and supernatural abilities (flying, communicating psychically not only with other humans but also with animals and trees and rivers (what.), and somehow preventing men's penises, technology, and weapons from working outside the limits of the city) would be explained. Eventually, Gearhart does describe more of the history of these hill women, who live in scattered communities throughout the countryside, reproducing themselves somehow without men (also not clearly explained if at all) and spending a lot of time guarding their borders and communing spiritually. But this history comes too little too late to make this a compelling narrative. And it still lacks some crucial details. How did the technology stop working? Magic? This isn't presented as a fantasy book but as a science fiction book, so I kept reading for explanations and feeling frustrated when I didn't find them.
The second reason I couldn't really get into the book was more ideological. There are some neat ideas within the wandering and the vagueness, but even those are often couched in problematic or troubling language. This book, written in the late 1970s, is born from a particular moment and particular tradition of feminist thought, one that I have never been able to endorse fully. At best, I have only been able to recognize why this approach might appeal to others and why it might seem, in the short term, useful. This type of feminism focuses primarily on "female nature" and the special gifts of women. It is essentialist (all women share this nature and these gifts and men do not), divisive, and can be harmful, both to the feminist movement and to human relationships.
Gearhart mostly seems to endorse this brand of feminism, but she does provide a brief critique of this idea as well. She has one of the benign male characters say the following:
"Just like every woman from the dawn of time. You demand your holy isolation from men so you can develop your unique female powers, but you are threatened to the core by the suggestion that we [men:] have equally unique powers--don't even whisper that they might be equally valuable."
This is an interesting response to the difference feminist insistence on the value of women's experience as somehow not only unique but also integral to women's being and value; however, it is not really followed up on, either in the discussion in which this statement is made or in the narrative. The tension presented here is allowed to just kind of fade into the background of the book as the final chapters move on to deal with a different issue.
In that final chapter another promising yet problematic idea is presented. The task of these women as they see it is to save the mother, the planet from ecological destruction and violence. Their task is this:
"To work as if the earth, the mother, can be saved.
To work as if our healing care were not too late.
Work to stay the slayer's hand,
Helping him to change
Or helping him to die.
Work as if the earth, the mother, can be saved."
Despite my discomfort with Earth Mother rhetoric generally (seeing women as close to nature in a way that men are not has a long and troubling history) and despite my dislike of the casting of men as slayers (this casting is made even more clear contextually before this chant), I do really like the idea of working as if it's not too late, working to make things better even if success is not certain.
The first is that The Wanderground, well, it kind of wanders. It does have a narrative, but it lacks a narrative drive or structure to help propel the reader through the text. In the end, there are only two reasons to keep reading the book: 1) enjoyment of the New Age-y spiritual tone of the book (I did not enjoy this), or 2) the (as it turns out, vain) hope that the source of the hill women's psychic powers and supernatural abilities (flying, communicating psychically not only with other humans but also with animals and trees and rivers (what.), and somehow preventing men's penises, technology, and weapons from working outside the limits of the city) would be explained. Eventually, Gearhart does describe more of the history of these hill women, who live in scattered communities throughout the countryside, reproducing themselves somehow without men (also not clearly explained if at all) and spending a lot of time guarding their borders and communing spiritually. But this history comes too little too late to make this a compelling narrative. And it still lacks some crucial details. How did the technology stop working? Magic? This isn't presented as a fantasy book but as a science fiction book, so I kept reading for explanations and feeling frustrated when I didn't find them.
The second reason I couldn't really get into the book was more ideological. There are some neat ideas within the wandering and the vagueness, but even those are often couched in problematic or troubling language. This book, written in the late 1970s, is born from a particular moment and particular tradition of feminist thought, one that I have never been able to endorse fully. At best, I have only been able to recognize why this approach might appeal to others and why it might seem, in the short term, useful. This type of feminism focuses primarily on "female nature" and the special gifts of women. It is essentialist (all women share this nature and these gifts and men do not), divisive, and can be harmful, both to the feminist movement and to human relationships.
Gearhart mostly seems to endorse this brand of feminism, but she does provide a brief critique of this idea as well. She has one of the benign male characters say the following:
"Just like every woman from the dawn of time. You demand your holy isolation from men so you can develop your unique female powers, but you are threatened to the core by the suggestion that we [men:] have equally unique powers--don't even whisper that they might be equally valuable."
This is an interesting response to the difference feminist insistence on the value of women's experience as somehow not only unique but also integral to women's being and value; however, it is not really followed up on, either in the discussion in which this statement is made or in the narrative. The tension presented here is allowed to just kind of fade into the background of the book as the final chapters move on to deal with a different issue.
In that final chapter another promising yet problematic idea is presented. The task of these women as they see it is to save the mother, the planet from ecological destruction and violence. Their task is this:
"To work as if the earth, the mother, can be saved.
To work as if our healing care were not too late.
Work to stay the slayer's hand,
Helping him to change
Or helping him to die.
Work as if the earth, the mother, can be saved."
Despite my discomfort with Earth Mother rhetoric generally (seeing women as close to nature in a way that men are not has a long and troubling history) and despite my dislike of the casting of men as slayers (this casting is made even more clear contextually before this chant), I do really like the idea of working as if it's not too late, working to make things better even if success is not certain.
February 27, 2012
This book is more fun to talk and think about in a historical context than it is to actually read. I chose to read it because I wanted to see how the author, the founder of the first women's studies department in the united states, used her imagination outside of academic discourse.
The lesbian utopia Gearhart has imagined is a series of snapshots into the lives of many hill women. This book was hard to follow in the traditional sense of how a novel is normally expected to be put together. I saw the lack of beginning, middle, and end as an intentional rejection of the prescribed way in which a writer is expected to format a story. The seemingly disjointed overview works well to paint a portrait of a collective of women who rely on telepathy, emotion, and the communal experience of the processing of trauma as their way of life.
This book precursors many ways of thinking about feminism and regionless forms of communication. The hill women's treatment of humans, animals, and plant life as equals and essential to life's vitality, lays a historical ground work for early thinking in ecofeminism.
I went to a lecture that mentioned this book where the lecturer suggested that Gearhart's use of telepathy also interestingly mirrors current usages of Internet communities in terms of how international activist communities have utilized the Internet for organizing, as well as things like individual and group instant messaging in relationship to Gearhart's concept of mindstretching and gatherstretching. I also thought the remember rooms sometimes mirrored what it is like to use Internet search engines.
I would definitely recommend this book as an interesting look into a true lesbian separatist utopia imagined in the late 70s. Very fun to talk about, even though it was a slightly tedious read.
The lesbian utopia Gearhart has imagined is a series of snapshots into the lives of many hill women. This book was hard to follow in the traditional sense of how a novel is normally expected to be put together. I saw the lack of beginning, middle, and end as an intentional rejection of the prescribed way in which a writer is expected to format a story. The seemingly disjointed overview works well to paint a portrait of a collective of women who rely on telepathy, emotion, and the communal experience of the processing of trauma as their way of life.
This book precursors many ways of thinking about feminism and regionless forms of communication. The hill women's treatment of humans, animals, and plant life as equals and essential to life's vitality, lays a historical ground work for early thinking in ecofeminism.
I went to a lecture that mentioned this book where the lecturer suggested that Gearhart's use of telepathy also interestingly mirrors current usages of Internet communities in terms of how international activist communities have utilized the Internet for organizing, as well as things like individual and group instant messaging in relationship to Gearhart's concept of mindstretching and gatherstretching. I also thought the remember rooms sometimes mirrored what it is like to use Internet search engines.
I would definitely recommend this book as an interesting look into a true lesbian separatist utopia imagined in the late 70s. Very fun to talk about, even though it was a slightly tedious read.
July 20, 2007
This is a fabulous feminist science fiction novel. Visionary. It is a compelling mixture of Utopian/Dystopian fiction. I really loved this book. It is harrowing and hopeful, sad and joyful. The basis of the story is that the Earth is revolting against partiarchy and industrialism and one day all the machines stop working... men become impotent (or infertile I forget which) and women are enslaved with the ruling men in the cities. Radical womyn begin escaping into the country and start beautiful communities where they learn skills we as humyns hadn't tapped into in a long time (if ever) such as willful telepathy, flying, ect. They lead rescue parties into the cities to extract more womyn. You get the idea. Great read.
September 17, 2018
Re-leyendo esta novela hay ciertos puntos que me gustaría destacar: 1) Se trata de una novela "clásica" de la ciencia ficción feminista y especialmente de la sci-fi lésbica; 2) Varias de las historias incluidas fueron publicadas originalmente como pequeños relatos en distintas revistas feministas, de ahí la carencia de una trama central.
The Wanderground es una buena novela, sin embargo, puede llegar a ser difícil de seguir durante las primeras secciones. Muchos de los relatos sencillamente describen la vida armónica y mística de las mujeres de la colina, careciendo de trama real alguna y (aparente falta de conexión) entre la una y la otra. Podría decirse que existen dos "tramas centrales" (sin que lo sean realmente) la primera se manifiesta como episodios no entrelazados, donde las mujeres de la colina rescatan a otras mujeres que viven brutalmente oprimidas en "La Ciudad," describiendo en el camino las dicotomías centrales de los contextos de la narrativa: hombres/ciudad, mujeres/naturaleza, hombres/tecnología, mujeres/telepatía.
La segunda trama (que sería lo más cercano a ello en el libro) involucra una serie de episodios (esta vez entrelazados) donde las mujeres de la colina tienen un encuentro con los "gentles" (hombres gays que las ayudan y buscan derrocar a "La Ciudad") en estos episodios se muestran las disputas internas entre las integrantes de la comunidad, ¿son o no estos hombres confiables?, así como la dicotomía constante de la novela, los gentles son diferentes a los demás hombres pero no lo suficientemente identificados con las mujeres.
El problema central del libro es precisamente esta carencia de argumento, el rescate de mujeres de la Ciudad parecería ser una trama central, sin embargo es más bien contingente, de igual manera el encuentro con los gentles no tiene cierre alguno, dejando bastantes preguntas al aire. Las virtudes del libro sin embargo, se hallan en la construcción narrativa de una filosofía feminista cultural, así como la estructuración profunda y bien descrita de una "utopía lésbica," algunos capítulos son particularmente buenos: "The Opening" y "The Remember Rooms" son mis favoritos.
Al final, una buena lectura para cualquier amante de la ciencia ficción feminista :)
The Wanderground es una buena novela, sin embargo, puede llegar a ser difícil de seguir durante las primeras secciones. Muchos de los relatos sencillamente describen la vida armónica y mística de las mujeres de la colina, careciendo de trama real alguna y (aparente falta de conexión) entre la una y la otra. Podría decirse que existen dos "tramas centrales" (sin que lo sean realmente) la primera se manifiesta como episodios no entrelazados, donde las mujeres de la colina rescatan a otras mujeres que viven brutalmente oprimidas en "La Ciudad," describiendo en el camino las dicotomías centrales de los contextos de la narrativa: hombres/ciudad, mujeres/naturaleza, hombres/tecnología, mujeres/telepatía.
La segunda trama (que sería lo más cercano a ello en el libro) involucra una serie de episodios (esta vez entrelazados) donde las mujeres de la colina tienen un encuentro con los "gentles" (hombres gays que las ayudan y buscan derrocar a "La Ciudad") en estos episodios se muestran las disputas internas entre las integrantes de la comunidad, ¿son o no estos hombres confiables?, así como la dicotomía constante de la novela, los gentles son diferentes a los demás hombres pero no lo suficientemente identificados con las mujeres.
El problema central del libro es precisamente esta carencia de argumento, el rescate de mujeres de la Ciudad parecería ser una trama central, sin embargo es más bien contingente, de igual manera el encuentro con los gentles no tiene cierre alguno, dejando bastantes preguntas al aire. Las virtudes del libro sin embargo, se hallan en la construcción narrativa de una filosofía feminista cultural, así como la estructuración profunda y bien descrita de una "utopía lésbica," algunos capítulos son particularmente buenos: "The Opening" y "The Remember Rooms" son mis favoritos.
Al final, una buena lectura para cualquier amante de la ciencia ficción feminista :)
February 26, 2023
DNF at 52%. It's rare I can't stomach finishing a book. I once went through a million word story I detested. I couldn't manage this short one. The story was caustic. I hate tales where all characters are binary, meaning they're either virtuous or evil. They're competent or pathetic. It's made worse when the distinction is sexist. All men are rapist. All women are super powered defenders. It's never explained why. Nor is there explanation why the male technology doesn't work outside their city and they basically become impotent outside the borders. Perhaps that's in the back 48%. I wouldn't subject myself to that level of punishment to find out.
Other annoyances was the invented dialect of the hill women. It was weird for the simple reason of being strange. It also had ample passive voice. Finally, all the typos. This book is 45-years-old, so I don't blame the author. I assume someone was lazy in the transcription to get a digital copy on Kindle Unlimited. If you must read this mess, find a print copy in a used bookstore.
Other annoyances was the invented dialect of the hill women. It was weird for the simple reason of being strange. It also had ample passive voice. Finally, all the typos. This book is 45-years-old, so I don't blame the author. I assume someone was lazy in the transcription to get a digital copy on Kindle Unlimited. If you must read this mess, find a print copy in a used bookstore.
November 19, 2025
I felt extremely uncomfortable reading the book, but Gearhart's ideas are interesting, especially in their historical context, and the writing is good.
For me this book is much more dystopian than utopian. In my opinion, the misandrous philosophy and the communal living style of the hill women is disturbing. For example the enhanced and shared perception is outright horrible for my neurodivergent self that has problems with sensory processing and hypersensitivity.
There is also some blatant prejudice for example against clothing like high heels that is apparently seen as only there for the male gaze.
I'm really not familiar with the sort of esotericism that the hill women practice and I find it cult-like and invasive.
However, I'm glad I read the book, it gave me a small insight into an era that I wasn't familiar with and the radical feminist thoughts of Gearhart and her allies.
For me this book is much more dystopian than utopian. In my opinion, the misandrous philosophy and the communal living style of the hill women is disturbing. For example the enhanced and shared perception is outright horrible for my neurodivergent self that has problems with sensory processing and hypersensitivity.
There is also some blatant prejudice for example against clothing like high heels that is apparently seen as only there for the male gaze.
I'm really not familiar with the sort of esotericism that the hill women practice and I find it cult-like and invasive.
However, I'm glad I read the book, it gave me a small insight into an era that I wasn't familiar with and the radical feminist thoughts of Gearhart and her allies.
January 17, 2024
Another of my five-star, all-time memorable books. A feminist, separatist utopian fantasy from long ago and far away when we all thought magic was afoot. Memorable is a definition of a "disability": something that three of us together can't do."
August 11, 2015
A lesbian separatist utopia.
Many women have left the Cities and live in the wilderness in harmony with nature through their psychic powers. They can communicate telepathically, monitor the borders at a distance, heal, fly, levitate objects, and reproduce without men.
Men cannot enter the women's land without dying, and cannot even leave the cities without becoming impotent. Also machines and guns won't work outside of the cities. There are some women still in the cites but they are brutally oppressed by the men. There are a few men who are a little bit psychic and not violent, they try to help the women but do not live with them, They are called Gentles.
I can see where people get the idea that lesbians hate men. The basic premiss of the story is that men are inherently violent and it is impossible for women and men to live, work, or love together, and the earth is going to die unless the men are killed, or change. There is some lip-service given to the idea that not all men are awful all the time, and maybe men can change. But overall it is very anti-male.
The female society she creates is a lot like the one in Ursula LeQuin's "Always Coming Home". Only that society included men.
The women are presented realistically, they are not saints, and the depiction of the psychic powers is unique and vivid. It takes up most of the book.
I'm not a man so I was not put off by the anti-male anger. I understand where it comes from and I can let it go. I don't feel that way about men but I understand why some women do. But most men will have trouble enjoying this book.
EDIT: Looking over the other reviews:
Christy is right about this being a period piece and advocating an essentialist view of feminism. I wrote my Women's Studies paper on the Essentialist and the Egalitarian branches of Feminism. There is a compromise between pretending there is no difference between men and women and insisting that all women share an essential feminine nature (and all men have an essentially masculine nature). Estrogen and testosterone do make a difference. Femininity and masculinity are real. But it is too simple to say that all women are feminine and all men are masculine. Even in the eighties I got in trouble in women's groups for being "too masculine".
This book does not really have a plot. It is a series of vignettes. I read that as a deliberate decision to abandon masculine linear narrative for a more feminine enfolding. (see Monique Wittig for more of this sort of feminine narrative.)
Two common complaints in the other review are: the spiritual tone, and the failure to explain how the psychic powers work. I believe these two complaints are related. What people are reading as "spiritual" is meant to be taken literately. (As in the movie Avatar.) The power of the women comes from the earth. The Consciousness of the Earth awoke and granted these powers to those women who could receive them. The women's powers come from the whole conscious biosphere and all the living creatures they connect with. But the women do not totally understand their own powers. The women know they can do some things but they don't know why the men can't leave the cities. The major plot point (such as it is) of the book is that the Gentles (the gentle men) have discovered that the mere presence of empowered women suppresses the violence (and technology) of men. This (beginnings of a) plot point occurs at the end of the book, along with the revelation that the Gentles can communicate psychically when working together. I would have liked to see these two revelations explored in greater detail. The end felt like the first book of a trilogy.
Many women have left the Cities and live in the wilderness in harmony with nature through their psychic powers. They can communicate telepathically, monitor the borders at a distance, heal, fly, levitate objects, and reproduce without men.
Men cannot enter the women's land without dying, and cannot even leave the cities without becoming impotent. Also machines and guns won't work outside of the cities. There are some women still in the cites but they are brutally oppressed by the men. There are a few men who are a little bit psychic and not violent, they try to help the women but do not live with them, They are called Gentles.
I can see where people get the idea that lesbians hate men. The basic premiss of the story is that men are inherently violent and it is impossible for women and men to live, work, or love together, and the earth is going to die unless the men are killed, or change. There is some lip-service given to the idea that not all men are awful all the time, and maybe men can change. But overall it is very anti-male.
The female society she creates is a lot like the one in Ursula LeQuin's "Always Coming Home". Only that society included men.
The women are presented realistically, they are not saints, and the depiction of the psychic powers is unique and vivid. It takes up most of the book.
I'm not a man so I was not put off by the anti-male anger. I understand where it comes from and I can let it go. I don't feel that way about men but I understand why some women do. But most men will have trouble enjoying this book.
EDIT: Looking over the other reviews:
Christy is right about this being a period piece and advocating an essentialist view of feminism. I wrote my Women's Studies paper on the Essentialist and the Egalitarian branches of Feminism. There is a compromise between pretending there is no difference between men and women and insisting that all women share an essential feminine nature (and all men have an essentially masculine nature). Estrogen and testosterone do make a difference. Femininity and masculinity are real. But it is too simple to say that all women are feminine and all men are masculine. Even in the eighties I got in trouble in women's groups for being "too masculine".
This book does not really have a plot. It is a series of vignettes. I read that as a deliberate decision to abandon masculine linear narrative for a more feminine enfolding. (see Monique Wittig for more of this sort of feminine narrative.)
Two common complaints in the other review are: the spiritual tone, and the failure to explain how the psychic powers work. I believe these two complaints are related. What people are reading as "spiritual" is meant to be taken literately. (As in the movie Avatar.) The power of the women comes from the earth. The Consciousness of the Earth awoke and granted these powers to those women who could receive them. The women's powers come from the whole conscious biosphere and all the living creatures they connect with. But the women do not totally understand their own powers. The women know they can do some things but they don't know why the men can't leave the cities. The major plot point (such as it is) of the book is that the Gentles (the gentle men) have discovered that the mere presence of empowered women suppresses the violence (and technology) of men. This (beginnings of a) plot point occurs at the end of the book, along with the revelation that the Gentles can communicate psychically when working together. I would have liked to see these two revelations explored in greater detail. The end felt like the first book of a trilogy.
March 28, 2014
This was a great concept and full of vivid description and the consistent presentation of a plausible utopia that is gynocratic in nature. However, the lack of a clear protagonist made it some what of a drag to read. Page after page passed by without any character interaction or development and as a reader who prefers engaging characters to a blanket imagining of concept, this fell a little flat for me. Nonetheless, there is a lot to appreciate here if you have an interest in utopian sci-fi or the study of genre and how it is transcended.
Some of the dialogue suffers from the past three decades of pop-culture and characters using terms like "earth touch" and "retro-sense" reads a little like being at a hokey self help seminar. Furthermore, once you get over the wording and start to appreciate the concept of a world in which new-age holistic therapy is highly effective, Gearhart drops the ideas and runs with an extended recount of how the society came about.
I wanted to like this a lot more than I actually did. However, if you are the sort of reader who can get carried away with the presentation of a fictional world without needing to relate to any of the people within it, I'd say that you'll probably really enjoy this.
Some of the dialogue suffers from the past three decades of pop-culture and characters using terms like "earth touch" and "retro-sense" reads a little like being at a hokey self help seminar. Furthermore, once you get over the wording and start to appreciate the concept of a world in which new-age holistic therapy is highly effective, Gearhart drops the ideas and runs with an extended recount of how the society came about.
I wanted to like this a lot more than I actually did. However, if you are the sort of reader who can get carried away with the presentation of a fictional world without needing to relate to any of the people within it, I'd say that you'll probably really enjoy this.
May 14, 2009
It's always unfortunate when feminism turns into anti-man sexism. It was a good book, but thematically bleh. Do radical feminists actually think that all men want to rape them (unless they're gay, of course, in which case they're mildly more acceptable). The anti-man thing was never really challenged in the book, so I have to assume that this is what the author actually believes to be a good thing.
July 20, 2016
No men equals women realizing their supernatural powers...??? I read this and used it in my thesis...it is rather interesting.
abandoned
March 23, 2015I stopped reading this book after one of the characters started communing with trees.
August 24, 2019
The Wanderground est un recueil de nouvelles toutes liées par des personnages récurrents et un même monde pseudo-post-apocalyptique où la technologie ne fonctionnent pas, les chats parlent (si j'ai bien compris?), les hommes ont réduit en esclavage les femmes, mais où il y a une poche de résistances de femmes "amazones" qui résistent encore. Les différents, courts, récits suivent une douzaine -vingtaine?- de femmes dans leur quotidien dans ce monde.
Je vais être bien honnête et dire que je n'ai pas trop compris la moitié du livre, pourtant, je lis couramment l'anglais, mais j'avais l'impression de lire un texte dans dont je comprenais presque trois mots sur quatre alors que ce sont tous des mots que je connais! D'accord, il y a énormément de description, l'action n'est pas du tout un moteur narratif (sauf un peu dans les trois derniers récits); ce n'est pas vraiment une quête, mais plus du "world-building" tout le long dans un univers un peu fantastique. Tous ces détails, ces descriptions feront probablement en sorte que la majorité du lectorat décrochera. L'idée n'est pas mauvaise, mais je crois que l'intention du livre est plus une présentation esthétique, d'un quotidien un petit peu extraordinaire, que d'un véritable récit.
C'est en plein le genre de récits que j'adore lire et analyser, mais celui-ci était absolument inintéressant à mes yeux, pas pour des questions de politique (il faudra que j'ai compris la moitié d'entre-elles pour même en parler honnêtement), mais peut-être d'esthétique qui ne m'ont pas touché. Je comprends que ça peut être un classique, mais c'est définitivement destiné à un public un peu érudit (pas du tout pour le grand public), son opacité analytique et de lecture rappelle par moment Les Guérillères de Monique Wittig. Bref, si vous n'avez pas aimé Les Guérillères, c'est mieux de ne pas essayer celui-là.
Je vais être bien honnête et dire que je n'ai pas trop compris la moitié du livre, pourtant, je lis couramment l'anglais, mais j'avais l'impression de lire un texte dans dont je comprenais presque trois mots sur quatre alors que ce sont tous des mots que je connais! D'accord, il y a énormément de description, l'action n'est pas du tout un moteur narratif (sauf un peu dans les trois derniers récits); ce n'est pas vraiment une quête, mais plus du "world-building" tout le long dans un univers un peu fantastique. Tous ces détails, ces descriptions feront probablement en sorte que la majorité du lectorat décrochera. L'idée n'est pas mauvaise, mais je crois que l'intention du livre est plus une présentation esthétique, d'un quotidien un petit peu extraordinaire, que d'un véritable récit.
C'est en plein le genre de récits que j'adore lire et analyser, mais celui-ci était absolument inintéressant à mes yeux, pas pour des questions de politique (il faudra que j'ai compris la moitié d'entre-elles pour même en parler honnêtement), mais peut-être d'esthétique qui ne m'ont pas touché. Je comprends que ça peut être un classique, mais c'est définitivement destiné à un public un peu érudit (pas du tout pour le grand public), son opacité analytique et de lecture rappelle par moment Les Guérillères de Monique Wittig. Bref, si vous n'avez pas aimé Les Guérillères, c'est mieux de ne pas essayer celui-là.
July 24, 2018
I first read this back in the 80s and, at the time, loved it. Just goes to show how one’s tastes change over 30 years or so. This time round I found myself becoming increasingly irritated with it. There was no plot or real story line to speak of. Here you have several different communities of women living out in the wild having separated themselves from men (and I really do “get” that, believe me) and each chapter was full of women doing “mindstretches” and “gatherstretches” and being very nice to each other. Nowhere did I read of any of the difficulties they would have faced providing themselves with food or even cooking a bloody meal. Oh, yes, they did make the odd cup of tea here or there but nothing that in any way reflected the gritty reality of living in this way - hence, the two stars only!!
June 28, 2023
I wrote an entire f*cking review for this and the app closed just before I was done so I won’t be re-writing it omg.
I liked it. There are valid criticisms of the theoretical basis of this book- particularly with regards to essentialism. It should be classed as fantasy not sci fi. Women are capable of far more violence than the book permits. Too much individualism with regards to the gentles. Whilst not following a traditional narrative arc, I read the female man before this and it has WAY more than that.
My previous review was 5 paragraphs. I think Good Reads saved you all from having to read it.
I liked it. There are valid criticisms of the theoretical basis of this book- particularly with regards to essentialism. It should be classed as fantasy not sci fi. Women are capable of far more violence than the book permits. Too much individualism with regards to the gentles. Whilst not following a traditional narrative arc, I read the female man before this and it has WAY more than that.
My previous review was 5 paragraphs. I think Good Reads saved you all from having to read it.
March 26, 2021
“To work as if the earth, the mother, can be saved.
To work as if our healing care were not too late.
Work to stay the slayers hand,
Helping him to change
Or helping him to die.
Work as if the earth, the mother, can be saved.
Almost didn’t read this as it looked dorky. Thanks to my daughter for gifting it to me.
May all my precious women friends continue to support me with their mindstretching, and I promise to do the same.
To work as if our healing care were not too late.
Work to stay the slayers hand,
Helping him to change
Or helping him to die.
Work as if the earth, the mother, can be saved.
Almost didn’t read this as it looked dorky. Thanks to my daughter for gifting it to me.
May all my precious women friends continue to support me with their mindstretching, and I promise to do the same.
March 21, 2021
I love this book so much! I really like that even though it shows this radically different society it still portrays different ways the women navigate it and some heart wrenching (and very real-life) conflicts within it. I love how diverse the women portrayed are. Just a really lovely and quite healing book.
October 17, 2022
I wanted to like this as an important work of lesbian separatist fiction but it was slow going. Gearhart is skilled at writing interpersonal dynamics, and that's a strong point of this novel, but she seems less well versed in genre conventions of science fiction and too much is left unexplained to hold the reader's attention throughout the entire book.
December 30, 2023
Okay, I have to admit, when I started reading this book, I totally rolled my eyes. But, I have to say, this book is an amazing hope for a feminine world of fierce devotion, beauty, care, and hope. I often find myself hiking and thanking the trees, the rocks, the steady things that create comfort on narrow or muddy paths taking the cues of the women in this book.
stopped-reading
November 4, 2024There's no singular narrative arc involving one or two characters, instead it reads like separate, but interconnected, short stories that develop a world. The changing of characters with each new story, despite being in the same world, just didn't grab me, and after a strong beginning, I constantly found myself thinking of other things.
January 1, 2025
This was odd but interesting. It had a great story and the world building was cool, I just wish it was more fleshed out. It was giving handmaids tale x dune bene gesserit; just a bunch of witchy women living in the woods & trying to save the earth from the greed of men. I’m surprised to see so many negative reviews on Goodreads for this, some people clearly missed the point.
September 18, 2024
I liked "Krueva and the Pony" when I read it in another anthology, and it was interesting to listen to the original recordings of Sally Gearhart reading her stories on Internet Archive, but ultimately I think this is the kind of writing I appreciate in theory but don't really enjoy reading.
September 27, 2017
too ... mystical for me. interesting though.
October 22, 2018
Illuminating. Life-changing.
May 29, 2021
Interesting. Mostly for the historical context of the author. Quite repetitive but some fun ideas. Potentially TERF-adjascent, although transness is not touched upon/existing in this future.
November 9, 2024
There's a lot of cool concepts and ideas but not really any cohesive story across the book. It's unclear what the purpose was.
October 2, 2019
I remember reading this book when I was living in the Santa Cruz Mountains at the little "free" school where my husband I taught. The chapter that stayed with me was the one in which the oldest woman in the Wanderground, Pelegine wakes and stretches her aching joints. I imagined myself waking and wondered what it would be like to be that old. I wanted to copy the yoga stretches she does as she unloosens her stiff limbs. It's odd that's Pelegine is the character that stays with me because many more of the characters are the age I was then, their twenties. I gave the book five stars not because it was always engaging, it was just amazingly different from the books I read. It was challenging and strange and created a female world that included
This world is one created by women who have had to leave the “City” because of so many episodes of violence against them, including rape. The woman band together to save themselves and to live in harmony with the land and animals. What happens is that in the community they set up outside the city, animals begin to speak to communicate with them; machines refuse to do the work men have designed them to do; woman can communicate over long distances with out phones or computers. They “mindstretch,” “worryread,” “enfold,” "mindlock,” control their breathing, connect their body rhythms and “windride.” I know that the book is very "new age," but reading it, I can imagine that all of these things are possible. It will be too much for many people, but I love Gearhart’s imagination; her creation of a world where woman’s intuition and womens’ connections transform what we think we have to endure.
This world is one created by women who have had to leave the “City” because of so many episodes of violence against them, including rape. The woman band together to save themselves and to live in harmony with the land and animals. What happens is that in the community they set up outside the city, animals begin to speak to communicate with them; machines refuse to do the work men have designed them to do; woman can communicate over long distances with out phones or computers. They “mindstretch,” “worryread,” “enfold,” "mindlock,” control their breathing, connect their body rhythms and “windride.” I know that the book is very "new age," but reading it, I can imagine that all of these things are possible. It will be too much for many people, but I love Gearhart’s imagination; her creation of a world where woman’s intuition and womens’ connections transform what we think we have to endure.
January 18, 2014
I'm about 75 pages in, and so far, I can definitely see why this is a historically significant work, but it's not that interesting. It's territory that is much better covered by Russ in the Female Man, LeGuin in Always Coming Home, and the work of Charnas. Definitely a reflection of the dominant cultural feminist framework of the time. Having completed the novel, I have a bit more appreciation for it's attempt to create an alternative narrative form, although it's not altogether successful. The last half of the novel has fragments that are a bit more conventional, that provide some sense of how the utopian society came into being. In response to an increasingly explicitly patriarchal and repressive society, women begin to escape to the hills and form there own society, which is paralleled by a series of unexplained mystical happenings, which make sense within a cultural feminist framework. Most of the early stories deal with healing, either of animals or women harmed by men, building an implicitly holistic worldview of the society, which is opposed to the society that they fled from in the later sections.
August 22, 2025
A visionary novel that tilters somewhere between utopia and dystopia. I loved the female-empowered, back-to-nature universe that the author created and the overall hopeful outlook that was painted. However, the execution lacked. The book was slow off the mark and seemed to end before any action actually happened. It feels like I have read the beginnings of a great epic that will never have the opportunity to play out.
May 31, 2009
Worth reading, but primarily because it is revered by the Fem Sci Fi folk. I did not enjoy this one as much because it's lighter than the average and a little bit fluffy. Okay, so I like my Fem Sci Fi man-hating. Still, if one wants to get a full rounded look at this genre, this title is a must.
Recommended reading from: http://www.feministsf.org/bibs/recomm....
Recommended reading from: http://www.feministsf.org/bibs/recomm....
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