Books by Allan Kolski Horwitz

Short stories from a master of the form, this collection scrapes away superficial assumptions and brings to life a multitude of characters whose concerns have dominated post-1994 South Africa but are in many respects timeless; in particular, they probe the limitations of middle class norms and blinkered identities and grapple with the diverse experiences of the many millions living on the margins of privileged ghettoes.Mixing satire with brutal realism, Kolski Horwitz dissects South African society with a keen and insightful eye.

The ten stories in Un/common Ground do, indeed, cover the unusual and generally unwritten about in South Africa with respect to both themes and styles. They range from adult love entanglements to the difficulties of children caught in the dissolution of families; from white supremacist racial murders to utopian societies of the 26th century; from drug induced hallucinations and trade in human body parts to the problems of creating a new identity for anti-apartheid activists faced by a radically changed world order.