Such a perfect work of fiction, you want to turn it over like a tapestry to see how it is done; how Tyler can sew gentle humour into a truly heart-wrenching story, and twist all of life's hurts into a family saga that is ultimately life-affirming, and a brisk and thrilling read. We readers are so lucky a writer like Tyler exists

Tyler's sentences are wholly hers, instantly recognisable and impossible to duplicate

She is and always will be my favourite author

Anne Tyler really is the best . . . her sheer brilliance makes it all seem so effortless

One of my favourite writers

Fans of Anne Tyler will be delighted by French Braid, a family saga that takes us from the 1950s to the present

A new Anne Tyler novel is an island of certainty in a tumultuous world

A queen of American literature

The ever reliable and delightful Anne Tyler

Lushly imagined, psychologically intricate, virtually inhalable...Tyler balances gracefully between tenderness and piquant humor, her insights into human nature luminous

[A] stunning novel

Clever and wise... French Braid is a family epic in miniature

A funny, joyful, brilliantly perceptive journey deep into one Baltimore family's foibles... An uncannily insightful novel that illuminates the kindnesses and cruelties of our daily lives

An absorbing and perceptive family saga

A tender, humorous dissection of life

A typically perceptive portrait of a family from the 50s to the modern day - the ties that bind and pull apart. A tender, humorous dissection of life

An author beloved by the most highbrow of critics, but who also produces stories that millions want to read

I've been Anne Tyler-ed. After finishing French Braid, the 24th novel from the formidable American novelist, I was going about my life thinking nothing particularly radical had happened to me. And then I thought about it, and I thought about it some more, and I realised - boom - she really is a master

Anne Tyler's genius lies in her ability to make the lives of this unremarkable family as enthralling as those of the most heroic soldiers or diabolical serial killers... This is a novel to add to the list of her greatest triumphs

Anne Tyler is the world's best living novelist... in French Braid Tyler demonstrates once again why she is so beloved... What she offers is...a glimpse into the very workings of the human heart

[A] wonderful novel

Tyler's books are full of subtleties, tender compassion and humanity, and French Braid is no exception

[Tyler's] style is striking... few are better at covering the passage of time, and hinting at the shifting cultural climate in a single sentence

Deft and graceful, French Braid is utterly convincing. Fifty-eight years since she published her first novel, Tyler continues to capture life's joys, contradictions and ordinary heartbreaks with humour and precision

Tyler pulls off the rare feat of presenting her characters both as they see themselves and as others see them

A warm-hearted exploration of the foibles and dynamics of family life

read her for the eccentric characters, the pitch-perfect dialogue, the humour and the tiny ordinary moments so exquisitely described they bring tears to your eyes

A warm-hearted exploration of the foibles and dynamics of family life

Tyler is a superb observer of family life... Heartbreak is deftly layered over a vibrant portrayal of the city, its codes and nuances

Anne Tyler is a wonderful storyteller and French Braid is another classic... Funny but hearthbreaking, too. I loved every single page

Anne Tyler's genius lies in her ability to make this unremarkable family so enthralling

Tyler is a genius at telling big stories with small details and this is an engrossing, fascinating family portrait

Gentle and comforting, but with a hidden core of desperate, cloying sadness, and is vintage Tyler

An astute, well-observed and compulsively readable saga

I adore her [Tyler] books. She’s written 24 novels and I’ve read every single one. She’s 81 and yet French Braid, her latest, is one of her very best

[A] brilliant, sensual, seductively plotted new novel... Hadley has written an extraordinary story about love and transformation.

Free Love is often deeply perceptive and affecting... it lets you imagine what it was like to wrestle with old and new ways of thinking in an age that shaped (and continues to shape) our own.

It's the 1960s and socialism, sex and nuclear anxiety have come crashing into the middle-class bubble Tessa Hadley novels usually operate so brilliant within.

A story about change and its limits, its beautifully judged ending will bring you to tears.

[An] acutely realised, deeply humane novel... Unmissable.

No novel published this year gave me more pleasure than Tessa Hadley's Free Love.

Nothing drew me in as conclusively as Free Love by Tessa Hadley, who is surely one of our most astute and deft observers of everyday lives.

Hadley's novels continue to get better and better - and this is her finest, most pleasurable yet... it's near enough the perfect present in book form

She is, in all her mastery of the craft, a writer's writer.