Dance With Snakes

Fast-paced and morally twisted, Horacio Castellanos Moya’s novel Dance With Snakes is not for those who rely on happy endings.

Set in Moya’s former home of El Salvador and shortly after a civil war, this frightening story follows three narrators in an exploration of society’s reactions to madness. 

The novel begins with protagonist Eduardo Sosa, an unemployed university graduate, exploring a mysterious yellow car parked across the street from his sister’s apartment.

His interactions with the old man living in the car quickly spiral out of control.

Only mere pages into the novel, Sosa is terrifying the city of San Salvador with a deadly posse of venomous serpents. “The ladies,” as Sosa refers to his snakes, kill dozens of innocent people and together they become the target of a nationwide manhunt.

The narration then moves to the deputy police commissioner, Lito Handal, who is in charge of stopping Sosa and his snakes.

Bitter towards his superiors and insecure about his performance, the deputy commissioner’s version of events serves to haul the reader out of the darkness of Sosa’s insane carnage, returning them to a relatively sober position. 

Rita, a newspaper reporter and the third narrator, tries to tell the whole story only to discover that the story is not and may never be complete.

In fact, her character highlights that the innumerable casualties and bizarre reptilian interactions do not accomplish any purpose within the bounds of the story. 

Instead it is the reaction of the police and the media to the meaningless bloodbath that is really being examined.

Furthermore, the reader’s own response to the novel holds importance; Sosa’s character has been so cleverly constructed that despite numerous heinous crimes, he elicits a strange support from the reader while the deputy commissioner becomes the bad guy.

Moya illustrates society’s inability to process madness. Both the deputy commissioner and the news reporter are unable to do their jobs properly when confronted with Sosa’s crimes.

Similarly, readers cannot believe what they are reading until they are eventually drawn into the strange world where snakes can dance and fall in love.

From beginning to end, Dance With Snakes shocks and disgusts.

The raw yet aloof descriptions of brutality throughout the novel keep the reader fully engaged. The bizarre exploration of themes like sexuality, violence and belonging make it difficult to process despite being an easy read and under 200 pages.

Highly recommended.

Published in Volume 65, Number 12 of The Uniter (November 18, 2010)

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