I normally don’t read short stories. I feel that the characters just don’t have enough time to develop in a short story compared to a full length novel. But this weekend, as I was reading A Clash of Kings by George R.R. Martin, I had a sudden urge to read something that doesn’t have to be 1000 pages long. I had to read around 50-100 pages just for Tyrion Lannister to appear again (Jon, Arya and Theon Greyjoy are also cool though). Anyway, so as I said earlier, reading something short really appe...

UGH, MAUREEN MCHUGH, I LOVE YOU. Maureen McHugh hasn't published anything since Mothers and Other Monsters in 2005 and hasn't published a novel since Nekropolis in 2001 and for a while it seemed like she has abandoned fiction entirely to write online alternate reality games, and so when I saw that she had published a new collection of short stories I kind of lost my shit with excitement. I don't understand why Maureen McHugh doesn't get more acclaim. Like, I respect Ursula K. Leguin's work, and

If you're into stuff like this, you can read the full review.Phildickian SF: "After the Apocalypse" by Maureen F. McHugh This kind of book epitomizes the reason why I prefer SF above anything else, reading-wise. In my last book review ("The Burning Room" by Michael Connelly), I ranted about the likeness of (some) novels in the SF field. Most of the novels of today are dull, uninspired, lifeless and more-of-the-same. This is the state of the art nowadays. And then there are short stories… If book...

This is an excellent collection, without an ounce of filler. The stories are all loosely post-apocalyptic, but each is defined by a different type of cataclysmic event: a zombie apocalypse, a couple of different viruses, etc. I always appreciate the chance to choose between cataclysms. Is it odd to feel safer after reading a book like this because some cataclysms are clearly preferable to others? In any case, while the settings are themed, what really sells the collection is the excellent charac...

Despairing about the proliferation of the generally repetitive short story collection? Fear and tremble not, for After the Apocalypse is here to save the day. Maureen F. McHugh’s collection continually conjured up the word "solid" and not in a patronizing way that one might use that word to politely describe an artistic effort that follows all the rules yet fails to captivate one’s attention or stimulate any of the other nerves in want of stimulation from art—but in the sense that it was taken i...

McHugh is a fabulous writer. In just a few spare words, she creates a story, an alternate world, and multi-dimensional characters that evoke an emotional response. She has a marvelous skill at developing a story and organically taking it in an unexpected direction, all without employing typical surprise endings.The Naturalist: After the zombie apocalypse, zombies are largely eradicated from the cities, but remain at prison encampments. One of the prisoners starts wondering about zombies. To the

Maureen F. McHugh doesn't really publish all that frequently—her standalone bibliography consists of just four novels and two short-story collections—but it's a real treat whenever she does. After the Apocalypse, one of those two collections, contains just nine short stories in one slim trade paperback, and six of them have already appeared elsewhere... but sometimes, as they say, good things come in small packages.Its deceptively simple cover is the first indication that what's within might be

Maureen McHugh has a knack—and I say 'knack' because it's even more elusive and intuitive than a talent—for investing each of her short stories with an immediately recognizable humanity, even when trafficking in genre tropes or the wantonly fantastical. In the premiere story 'The Naturalist,' the trappings of a traditional zombie story are elevated by an eminently human protagonist named Cahill whose thoughts and concerns aren't those of a caricatured horror movie hero—caught in a dumbshow of hi...

This is McHugh's second short story collection, gathering six stories that first appeared from 2007-2010 and adding three that are published for the first time. McHugh is a very skilled writer, and these stories are excellently crafted pieces, very literary in feel and execution, the kind of things that your high school English teachers made you write essays about to interpret. The first and last stories are the most traditional science-fictional works, The Naturalist being a post-zombie-apocaly...

Posted at Shelf InflictedI’m not sure why I haven’t read more of Maureen McHugh’s stories. She has a subtle, quiet style and writes with a graceful economy of language that is powerful but not overwhelming. There is no filler here, no unnecessary words or overly descriptive scenes. What these haunting stories have in common is their exploration of various ways in which the world could fall apart and how humanity copes. I loved these wonderfully character-driven stories and am thrilled I was able...

Most of these short tales end abruptly. I mostly didn't mind. A couple of 3.5 star stories; the rest were mostly 2.5 to 3 stars. Check this collection out if you like variety in your end-of-world scenarios.VERDICT: 2.9 stars for me, rounded to 3. GR aggregate rating is ~3.6 stars, so most readers enjoyed it a bit more than I did.

when this came into the store, i thought "huzzah" because i already own two of her other books that looked really good. of course, i have not read them. this is the way i operate - i buy books and i squirrel them away until it feels right to read them, frequently owning several books by a single author who looks good to me, without having anything upon which to base that impression.it is a very peculiar kind of madness. but then mike reynolds reviewed this book,and he specifically recommended it...

I have a love/hate relationship with short stories. I love how much originality it requires to write a really good short story. Character development, scene development, all of it has to take place so quickly, and just when you get comfortable, the story is over. That is also why I hate short stories. Sometimes, the sign of a good short story is that I would drop everything to read a novel that took place inside the story. That is exactly what happens in After the Apocalypse - I wanted more than...

I've been reading a lot of short story collections lately. The three I've consumed over the last week or two have been pretty thematically cohesive for pots of author stew, this one most of all. Though not every or even most of these stories are plague-ish tales, there's a thread running through them that is basically, I dunno, doom? The sad, scrambling beginnings after sobering ends? Whatever it was, this broad framework made it easier to not feel so guilty about or flummoxed by reading them in...

This stories were all well written, and was a pretty strong collection.The Naturalist: 4 starsIt's the zombie apocalypse, and the main character is one of several men in an enclosed city with other convicts, and zombies. The main character begins watching the zombies, and experimenting with what might attract them and what might keep them at bay. I felt like I’d read more stories in this world.Special Economics: 4.5 starsAfter a worldwide bird flu and billions of deaths, we follow Jjjjjjjjj as s...

Didn't love this as much as the rest I've read of her so far, but all the stories were good. They just didn't grab me emotionally as much. The best one to me was the last one, "After the Apocalypse", because I like my dystopian stories to make me uneasy and kick my in the butt.

This should more accurately be shelved as speculative fiction. Much of it didn't have anything to do with science nor were many of the stories post apocalyptic on anything save a personal or small scale. Some were just economic bumps. She's good at setting a mood & characters, but seemed to lack a point too often.Table of Contents:The Naturalist was a true tale of horror with zombies. Very well done even though that subject wore out for me years ago. 4 starsSpecial Economics was OK. Didn't seem

1.5/5You can take these 1.5 rounded up to two stars as the average score of the nine stories, with 'The Kingdom of the Blind' getting a solid 4.5 stars, a couple others getting threes, and the rest a mix of ones and twos. A reiteration of the usual excuse of my not being a fan of short stories goes here, along with the acknowledgement that I'm simply too sensitive to prose to be able to excuse a poor show of it if the narrative(s) don't excel in other respects. Otherwise, I'm just rather sick of...

Spaghetti code that made no sense. BHP DMS made a Microsoft operating system look elegant and streamlined, but it could do some amazingly complex stuff. Great characters, good stories, not a feel-good vibe in the lot. I usually finished each one wanting to know more.

I first read the title story in The Best Science Fiction and Fantasy of the Year Volume 6, and that's when I knew I had to read more. Then McHugh's After the Apocalpyse was one of the nominees on the Philip K. Dick Award list, which gave me another excuse.As in most short story compilations, a few of these didn't do it for me, but I like her perspective of these post-apocalyptic stories. The naturalist view of zombies, drug testing in a new millennium, and the ethics of survival... plus people w...