" A coming-of-age novel, but not in a chick-lit way. 1946 Yorkshire - three girls have just won scholarships to University. Gardam continues to remind me of Penelope Fitzgerald; there's something about her economical style and how she doesn't spell everything out for you. Plus, there's a surreal quality to her work, in which it doesn't seem to matter that events are slightly implausible. I've read so much Anglo WWII stuff, but this one really gives a sense of what life was like for the young people who went through their adolescence during the War. "
— Susann, 12/7/2013