The writer has both control of the material and a loving eye, and the warmth of Thorpe’s tone, together with the thoroughness of her imagination and the artfulness of her pacing, means that skepticism is kept at bay. She sells us on both the characters and the plot, and her refusal to moralize, her ability to get behind her characters despite their mess and fecklessness … Keeping the ship steady is one of the hardest things to do in an accessible work of comic fiction; often, a less skilled writer will decide too late that they want depth and meaning, and resort to chucking something difficult into the mix … Thorpe ends this enormously entertaining and lovable book by offering her characters a way out. We want it for them, and they deserve it.
