"After the Apocalypse": A Review

One of the books I bought at the Boston Book Fest was a new release from a local publisher of alternative fiction, Small Beer Press: After the Apocalypse by Maureen F. McHugh. Being a relatively short collection of stories, it was manageable with my busy schedule. Stories of the apocalypse--and the aftermath--always intrigue me, if in a morbid way, so I thought I'd enjoy it. And I must say, I've never read any science fiction like it.

The cover art's cool, too.

It's not just that it's short fiction (most of the sci-fi that I've read has been long-form). McHugh's stories focus on a very small social group of humans, whether it's fragments of a family or a group of diffident individuals, affected by a catastrophic event--an apocalypse of sorts, but more along the lines of Junot Diaz's definition in a Boston Review article published earlier this year. Not the kind of apocalypse you'd expect. In the zombie story, "The Naturalist," zombies have been confined to a small area in Ohio, where they send convicts to be punished. In another story, an avian flu epidemic in Asia decimates China's population, creating ripe conditions for capitalist greed to thrive, at the expense of survivors. In another, a dirty bomb goes off in Baltimore, killing countless civilians and triggering a teenager's dissociative personality disorder. Most of the stories take place in the aftermath of such events as a disease epidemic, economic crash, and terrorist attacks. These are only minor compared to the popular definition of apocalypse. In fact, the only story that comes close to such a definition is the title story, caused by a combo of terrorism, economic disaster, and sweeping electrical failures (all exacerbated by a corrupt and inefficient government, no doubt).

Most of the reader's knowledge of these events is confined to the characters, who are all everyday people, so they'd be hard-pressed to know the whole story behind what happened. They're mechanics, factory workers, store managers, and unemployed--the closest one gets to a career typical of the sci-fi genre is an entry-level computer programmer. In this way, McHugh's stories fit the sci-fi elements neatly into a microcosmic realism. Some stories, like the purely realistic "Honeymoon," are barely sci-fi at all, the events and time period only slightly out-of-sync with contemporary reality. The result is stories that are worthy of just about any literary tradition, challenging the conventional view of the sci-fi genre. These characters are among the most developed and diverse I've found in sci-fi, as  characterization in the genre often takes a back seat to concept. These stories are no more unrealistic than any other work of fiction--just because a deadly chicken disease or sweeping southwestern drought haven't happened, doesn't mean they won't. They certainly can happen, under certain circumstances. Needless to say, this realistic element (due in part to the character-driven nature of the stories and no need for world-building) made the stories incredibly moving and engaging, and I wished some of them were longer. "Special Economics" had nice pacing for the most part, then rushed through the plot towards the end, and I wanted to see more of what happened in "Going to France" (like, why were the flying people going to France, of all places?). Of course, not all the stories charmed me so. A couple of the stories, like "Kingdom of the Blind," got bogged down in nebulous technical jargon that strained my comprehension of the plot, and distracted me from the story. McHugh is sometimes gratuitous with exposition and character description in a way most good writers are not, baldly inserting brief character descriptions that disrupt the flow of the narrative. The averageness of the characters made them interesting, but frustrating for someone who's more interested in their world than they are. Still, I kept reading, interested in the circumstances and how it would all end. Hell, I even cared about some of the characters.

Though there probably should have been at least one other proofreader looking at it, since I found a few embarrassing errors in the text. But since the book's coming from a small indie publisher, it's an unfortunate side-effect of a small budget. Some of the stories I was hard-pressed to define as "apocalyptic"--though it's not just the end of the world. The most literary moment in the collection occurs in the last story, with a July's People-style conclusion. It also sums up all the preceding stories, too, in a way. These characters seek freedom from their suffering, like we all do; it's just that their circumstances compel them to take it up a notch. And that's how fiction makes life more interesting. The apocalypse, whatever its shape or form, is brought to us, as real as any 9/11-style disaster. And as profound.

Overall, I give it 3.5 out of 5 stars, with my favorite stories being "Special Economics," "Useless Things," "The Effect of Centrifugal Forces," and "After the Apocalypse."