What Remains After a Fire By Kanza Javed Ilqa Publications ISBN: 978-969-640-361-6 222pp.

Kanza Javed is a relatively new name in the firmament of fiction writers, but she has already made her presence felt. Originally from Lahore, she holds an MFA from West Virginia University, is the winner of the Reynolds Price Prize for Fiction, and her debut novel, Ashes, Wine and Dust was shortlisted for the New American Fiction Prize for 2022.

Her short stories have been featured in American Literary Review, The Punch Magazine and Salamander, as well as in In the New Century: An Anthology of Pakistani Literature. The last one was edited by Muneeza Shamsi and published by Oxford University Press, Pakistan.

What Remains After a Fire is a collection of eight of Javed’s stories. The book gives the reader a taste of the author’s prowess. Javed writes with clarity. She knows what she wants to convey and she weaves the tale to project exactly that. Her stories have an agenda, but that does not mean they are dull or sermonise.

The running thread found across the eight offerings in What Remains After a Fire concerns subjects familiar to Pakistani readers. They encompass patriarchy, the low position of women in society and the fact that it is generally accepted, hypocrisy — especially in overtly religious settings — and marital problems. Javed contends that these issues plague every stratum of society. The rich are not exempted.

The stories are not peopled with happy characters. They have angst, discontentment and a yearning for a better or, at least, a different life. Javed deals with such human........

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