PositiveThe Guardian (UK)Though this model of relationship-as-power-struggle is hardly new, Dolan brings a fresh 21st-century sensibility to it ... Dolan writes in a deadpan style. Sentences are short. Aperçus are withering. Emotions are dealt with baldly, dryly ... caustic wit ... An entire novel in this vein might become wearing, but Dolan takes her narrative to a new level ... Dolan skilfully reveals to us how Ava’s choices are all made with self-protection in mind ... It’s not easy to sustain interest in someone so relentlessly floundering for self-knowledge, and the book flags once Ava and Edith are together. That’s partly because Edith herself is only lightly sketched in ... This gives the novel a strangely solipsistic feel, like a hall of mirrors, where every attempt to gaze outward is met only by your own face. Ava is an accurately drawn emblem of the zeitgeist, but as such, she stands apart from it, isolated ... There are intimate moments here, even if they do occur at one remove. Nolan does a brilliant job of harnessing technology to her story, specifically the phone.
Melissa Broder
RaveThe Guardian\"This is love in the age of consumer capitalism, and Broder is pin-sharp on its disillusionments ... Despite the bad-sex scenes and dark humor, this is no comedy. (Though there is some unintentional humor from the malapropian slang used by the British character who dismisses a lingerie shop with \'Victoria’s Secret? It’s faff!\') It’s a knife-tip dissection of 21st-century anomie, and its clear-sighted depiction of muddy-headed people makes for bracing reading—like a dip in the freezing, salty sea.
