RaveThe San Francisco Chronicle... will feel painfully familiar to those who can recall the anxiety that people across America felt in that year and those that have followed it. The many that revere Smith will take a thrill in her vivid recollections of long ago days on the stage and the streets of Greenwich Village, while anyone consumed by the fears of today will find them expressed vividly by a beautiful voice.
Ruchika Tomar
RaveThe San Francisco ChronicleAn exploration of the intimate and powerful friendships between women is at the novel’s center ... The winding path of the timeline, with chapters that careen back and forth rapidly, propels the story and amplifies the suspense ... Despite her absence, Penny is a fully realized character whose perfectly rendered dialogue and mannerisms create an indelible image. She feels fully alive through Cale’s recollections, and we see that Cale’s quest to find her is also a quest to understand someone who, despite their closeness, remained a cipher ... It is in the exploration of Penny and Cale’s disparate reactions to the violation that A Prayer for Travelers is at its most breathtaking ... Tomar has done justice to a portrait of two young women coming of age in a world full of hard men and has created a world where the brutality of the landscape is matched by the circumstances that her characters live in ... as much a story of the American West as it is a meditation on the lives of young women.
