CRITICAL REVIEWS      

"A sharp-eyed, witty writer…Miss Galen’s talent burns with a very hard light." The New Yorker

"Her irony is devastating. Her comedy is outrageous and exact." The Times Literary Supplement (London)

"The contacts among [the characters] are explosive, funny, tragic and constantly surprising; the book is comic, ironic and profound…A book with genuine wit." Book of the Month Club News.

"This is a modern novel in that the beginning and the end are interchangeable, the characters don't really count, and nothing actually happens. [one character], perhaps the least attractive American in recent fiction...an American jellyfish from the accidentally existentialist school...is simply a blob." Star [defunct] (Washington D.C.)

"The motives involved are composed of so many facets that it is possible to keep seeing the events in different perspectives…" Irish Times

"A distinctive blend of comic intelligence and weightiness…Miss Galen maintains a brilliant poise between the vast horrors of her implications and the comic minutiae of her social observations…Really striking." The New Statesman (London)

"Written with such energy, wit and flexibility that its atmosphere of charged hysteria is intensified rather than exploded by comedy. Daring, imaginative..." The Times Literary Supplement (London)

"A quite brilliant talent for creating emotions." York’s Post (England)

"Marvellous scenes of comedy…uncompromising honesty." Sunday Telegraph (London)

"Comic, deadpan, very intelligent." Oxford Mail (England)

"Nazi-Jew Ski Novel Confusing Miss Galen is trying to tell us something. I, for one, do not know what it is...Shortly after P. 200 Miss Galen begins to have a story." Observer (Charlotte, N.C.)

"When I finished this book I laid it down, slowly, in solemn respect for the author’s razor-sharp mind…Wit, drama and a depth of thought and feeling." Times (Chattanooga, Tenn)

"Nina Galen has a nice talent for making her readers think and enjoy themselves at the same time. Her novels are carefully constructed and are obviously the result of a wealth of scholarship and uncommon good judgment." New Mexico Magazine

"So many new books published today, especially fiction, serve up the same meatless and soapy rehash of themes and plots for the sole purpose of beguiling and entertaining a reader that it is a rare case — and a pleasure indeed — to find a novel that actually comes to grips with ideas." The Santa Fe Reporter

"Despite the above letterhead [The Macmillan Company], I write in a totally non-official capacity — as a reader, not an editor. I was fortunate enough to read galleys of your forthcoming novel and this note is simply to congratulate you on what I feel is one of the most fascinating and brilliantly executed books I’ve come across in some time. It seems to me you have perfectly combined the traditional and modern forms of the novel…to create a work that has meaning, wit, importance, relevence and style. Your characters are alive; your symbols work; your ending is original and just right; you made me laugh. I wish you critical and commercial success commensurate with the excellence of your work, and I look forward expectantly to your next novels. Again, my congratulations." Richard Marek

"My wife says that I mustn’t use the word "delicious"; that it isn’t manly. But it is a delicious book, and I can’t think of a better word for it. It has such quiet, devastating moments; I found myself laughing again and again, and reading bits of it to my wife, who laughed along with me. And it has other things besides, of course; it is extremely wise, and sensitive, and properly — but very quietly — bitter; and beautifully written…I wish it — and you — all possible success." Robert Nathan