The important thing to remember when thinking about _White Apples_ and its follow up, _Glass Soup_, is that these are primarily love stories. The tensions between chaos and control, the willingness to love the current form of the universe while maintaining openness toward its eventual demise, are all analogs of romantic love: what preserves it, what kills it, what makes it grow. Carroll doesn't write genre fiction, but if he did, he is probably best understood as a magical -- or even supernatural -- realist. He maps our real lives, and our emotional lives, onto a fantastic landscape. His books are our hearts writ large. Only the imaginative can comprehend the insights provided by such imaginative work. If you're not used to this type of writing, try it...with an open mind.