Call me a literary slob, but I just don't get it. I understand the art of writing should always push the borders, delve into experimentalism. But, for me, like visual art, or any art for that matter, if we fail to communicate with our audience, if our art has become so internal as to be insular and isolated, if we fail to communicate, then our art has, to some degree failed.

And that's how I feel about Ursula Pflug's incendiary, relentless anthology of speculative short stories, After the Fires.

Now, don't get me wrong; the stories are brilliant from a technical point of view. Pflug's work is reminiscent of what avaunt guard bad boys of the '60s and '70s like Harlan Ellison were doing. But as a reader, and perhaps after all not a very perspicacious one, Pflug's internalising and metaphor was lost on me. I felt adrift in her sea of gritty, dystopic worlds to the point I had no landmarks, no clues, no common points of reference by which I could steer and make sense of what I read. All I as left with was a sense of desolation, frustration and extreme oppression. And I still can't tell you really what the stories are about. Lost love? Perhaps. Social commentary? Maybe. Futuristic visions? Beats me. I can't really say the stories were definitely about any of that.

I can say Pflug's stories are deeply personal, shattered windows into her mind and world.

Would I recommend After the Fires? I'm not sure. Did I enjoy reading After the Fires? Definitely not. Would I look for anything else of Pflug's? Probably not.

However, if you, as a reader, enjoy the surreal, the incomprehensible, the gritty to the point of suicidal meanderings, then by all means read Pflug's anthology. ( )