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Edilberto Tiempo's fourth volume of short stories (he is also the author of such novels as Cry Slaughter, More Than Conquerors, To Be Free, Cracked Mirror, The Standard Bear and Farah) brings together seven tales set mostly in Dumaguete, Siquijor, and Massin in the central Philippines. The selections are loosely united by a snake theme, which is either folkloric or metaphorical, at the heart or on the periphery of each story in the collection.
"Snake Twin" itself is the most obvious of these thematic stories. Dr. Klaus Peter Lembke, from Tubingen University in Germany, visits Silliman University in Dumaguete as part of his research on snake twins, "persons born with a snake for a twin." Ariston Paler, a mathematics professor at Silliman, meets Lembke on the plane to Dumaguete and plays the role of host while Lembke is in residence and pursuing his research. This simple framework provides a structure on which Tiempo can hang a collection of myths, folktales, and scholarly (?) research on snake twins in the Philippines.
"Tierra Encantada" has a similar plot line. Jacques, a Frenchman and maker of documentary films, visits Siquijor, which is forty-five minutes by pump boat across the channel from Dumaguete. Siquijor "is known as the land of superstition, [and also] known by three other names--Diwata which is the local word for superstition, Isla Misteriosa, and Tierra Encantada"--to make a documentary film about...